Roof work in a Michigan winter: snow, safety and emergency tarps

How much snow Michigan’s code assumes, county by county

The state’s Table R301.2(5) sets a ground snow load for each county or jurisdiction, in pounds per square foot (psf). It runs from 20 psf in most of Wayne County and in Monroe, Lenawee and Hillsdale counties to 90 to 100 psf in Keweenaw County. A few examples show how steep the climb is:

County	Ground snow load (psf)	Notes from the table
Wayne	20	Northville is listed at 25
Oakland, Macomb, Washtenaw	25	Ann Arbor, Ypsilanti and Saline are listed at 20
Genesee, Kalamazoo	30	Genesee has some cities listed at 25
Kent, Saginaw, Midland	35
Marquette	70
Houghton	80
Keweenaw	90 to 100

Two cautions come with the table. These are pounds per square foot of snow on the ground, not the load a roof must carry, which a designer derives from the ground figure. And townships can differ from their counties: Kalamazoo County, for one, lists a higher figure for some townships. Your building department confirms the number that applies to your address. If you want the full list, our snow load by county guide goes through it.

Why you should stay off a snowy or damaged roof

OSHA’s fall prevention page says falls are the leading cause of death in construction and counts 389 fatal falls to a lower level out of 1,034 construction deaths in 2024. Michigan’s construction safety standard, MIOSHA Part 45, adopts the federal fall protection rules for roofers: on a steep roof with unprotected edges six feet or more above the level below, employees need guardrails, safety nets or personal fall arrest. That standard binds employers and their workers. Our interpretation is that a homeowner on their own roof falls outside it, though the fall is just as hard.

Snow and ice hide the surface, so you cannot judge it by eye. For a leak that shows up in a ceiling, photograph the stain, limit the water inside and phone a company instead of going up with a shovel. A crew that works under Part 45 has fall protection gear, and you probably do not.

Emergency tarping in the middle of winter

If a storm has opened the roof, the insurance and safety advice agree. DIFS says most policies require you to take reasonable steps to prevent further damage, gives covering a damaged roof with a tarp as its example, and says to keep receipts because the expenses may be reimbursable. It also says to make only temporary repairs until the insurer has inspected, and to photograph and video the damage before you clean up. Does homeowners insurance cover a roof leak has the claim steps in order.

OSHA’s tarping fact sheet adds the safety side. It warns that installing tarps risks falls and electrocution, says not to work on a damaged roof until its structural integrity has been determined, and says never to install a tarp during a storm while it is windy or raining. That is advice to use the emergency roof repair route and let the crew choose the moment instead of hurrying in the dark.

The three-day cancel right and its emergency waiver

A roofer who knocks on your door after a storm is the typical case for Michigan’s home solicitation sales law. You may cancel a sale of more than $25 that was solicited and agreed at your home until midnight of the third business day after signing, and the contract has to carry notice of that right. Sales after you call a company, or from a general advertisement, can fall outside it.

An emergency changes that. Under MCL 445.112(5), the cancel right is gone if you ask for the work without delay because of an emergency, the seller has substantially begun the work, and you give a separate, dated, signed and handwritten statement describing the emergency and waiving the right. All three have to be true. A leak through the ceiling in January may be an emergency, but a pre-printed waiver handed over at the door does not meet the handwriting requirement. Read the whole paper before you sign, and see storm chasers and assignment of benefits for how that interacts with insurance.

Permits and licenses do not pause for snow

Roofing is not on the state’s list of permit exemptions, and enforcement is local. LARA’s jurisdiction list shows city-level building departments in places such as Detroit, Grand Rapids, Flint, Lansing and Kalamazoo, so the office that decides whether your job needs a permit is a phone call away in most large cities. Ask about it before the work starts, including emergency repairs.

On licensing, a person doing roofing work of $600 or more needs the residential maintenance and alteration license with the roofing craft, according to the licensing statute. An owner working on their own home and jobs under $600 in aggregate are exempt. An unlicensed contractor risks a civil fine of $5,000 to $25,000. Ask for the license number and look it up on LARA’s lookup before you pay a deposit, in an emergency as much as any other time.

What we could not source about cold-weather installation

Many roofing pages tell you what temperature shingles can be installed in, how sealant strips behave in cold, or when a roof must wait for spring. We looked for a Michigan, code or manufacturer source that states such limits and did not find one we can cite. That includes the 2015 code text, which does not set a temperature. Ask any company that offers to install in winter what the shingle manufacturer’s instructions require, and ask for the answer in writing.

What the DIFS winter statement covers

DIFS says standard homeowners policies cover a wide range of winter-related disasters such as burst pipes, ice dams, wind damage, leaky roofs and a building collapse caused by the weight of ice or snow, and it advises keeping gutters clean to prevent ice damming. The statement is not a promise that every winter loss is paid, since your policy wording and the cause of the loss decide. For the ice dam side of winter, our ice barrier guide covers the code and the attic.

Michigan’s table also lists the ice barrier as required statewide, which matters when a winter leak points to a failed eave. The roof leak page explains how a leak is traced.