Primary data only. Houston publishes no roofing permit file with a job value; the city open data portal was searched . TDI file pulled .
Houston's weekly permit report lists zip code, date, type, project number, address and comments. It is not a roofing dataset with a value, and nothing in it records layers removed.
What a tear-off line should contain does not depend on the city: the number of layers, the rate per square, and whether disposal sits inside that line or is billed apart.
What Do The Public Files Hold?
City of Houston Open Data Portal
We searched https://data.houstontx.gov/ on for roof, reroof, building permit, permits issued and valuation. The portal returns no per-permit roofing dataset, so there is no declared value to read and nothing that records the work inside the job, such as layers removed.
For the 8 Houston counties, the Texas Department of Insurance publishes homeowners paid losses by county and loss type, and it does not break them out by tear-off work, so TDI cannot price Houston tear-offs either. The Houston roof replacement cost page prints the permit figures that can be computed for no permit file and the TDI series for 8 counties, each with its source URL, pull date and row count; the tear-off question has no price in either.
What Do Houston Re-Roof Permits Show?
Houston gives this site no per-permit roofing file, so there is no permit count and no declared value to print for the Houston roof tear-off question. A tear-off would be one more unrecorded line inside a permit this site cannot read. The TDI file below is the only dollar series for Houston, covering 8 counties, and it counts insurer payments, not jobs.
City of Houston Open Data Portal
The searches behind this page are stored one query at a time. Each row below is one search run on the portal on October 13, 2026, with the number of packages it returned and the titles the portal gave those packages.
| Query | Packages returned | Dataset titles |
|---|---|---|
| roof | 0 | none returned |
| reroof | 0 | none returned |
| building permit | 1 | City of Houston Residential Building Permits by Month and Year |
| permits issued | 4 | All Paid Vehicle Permits 05/01/2011 to 04/30/2012; PROJECT: Alcohol Renewal Process Project Overview; All Active Transportation Companies Regulated by ARA Transportation Section a...; All Active Vehicles Regulated by ARA Transportation Section as of 05/01/2013 |
| valuation | 1 | Property Tax |
The roof and reroof queries each returned no package, and the valuation query returned one package titled Property Tax. The one building permit package describes permits grouped by month and year, not one row per job with a declared value. That is why this page carries the search record in place of a permit count for the city.
What Did Houston Insurers Pay Per Policy Around Tear-Off Jobs?
For this Houston tear-off page, the TDI file lists Harris, Fort Bend, Montgomery, Brazoria, Galveston, Liberty, Waller and Chambers, 8 counties in all. For 2025 in Houston, the table shows paid losses labeled Wind, the file's Loss per policy for Wind and for Total Paid Loss, and Wind as a share of total paid. For the roof tear-off question in Houston, these are insurer payments on homeowners claims, read from https://tdi.texas.gov/general/documents/home-owners-losses-by-county-25.csv pulled October 13, 2026. They do not price a tear-off anywhere in Houston.
| County | Wind paid | Wind per policy | Total per policy | Wind share of total paid |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Harris | $380,003,155 | $490 | $930 | 52.7% |
| Fort Bend | $93,336,871 | $496 | $899 | 55.2% |
| Montgomery | $117,034,701 | $682 | $1,133 | 60.2% |
| Brazoria | $21,775,692 | $227 | $623 | 36.4% |
| Galveston | $9,261,438 | $104 | $554 | 18.7% |
| Liberty | $3,828,931 | $233 | $718 | 32.4% |
| Waller | $2,737,357 | $265 | $536 | 49.4% |
| Chambers | $1,441,221 | $118 | $455 | 25.8% |
In 2025, Montgomery County has the highest Wind loss per policy among the 8 Houston counties the file lists for 2025, at $682, and Galveston County the lowest, at $104. Added across the Houston counties on the tear-off page, Wind paid was $629,419,366 on 1,359,355 policies in 2025, which is $463 per policy, against $1,107 in 2024. For this Houston tear-off page, across 2019 to 2025 in the Houston counties, the highest year was 2024 at $1,107 per policy and the lowest year was 2022 at $302.
TDI's file leaves out wind or hail losses paid by the Texas Windstorm Insurance Association, and Brazoria, Chambers and Galveston counties are TWIA counties, so their Wind figures in the Houston tear-off table are understated.
Worked Example: A Tear-Off Line Against Fort Bend County Numbers
Fort Bend County is the second largest of the Houston counties, 188,301 in 2025. TDI lists $93,336,871 of Wind paid losses there. $93,336,871 divided by 188,301 is $496 per policy, which is the $496 the file prints in its Loss per policy column. That $496 averages every policy in Fort Bend County and says nothing about the layers or square count of one tear-off there.
No second check is possible here. With no permit file to count, the TDI series is the only arithmetic this site can show for Houston.
What Moves A Tear-Off Quote?
The Houston files above cannot rank these roof tear-off cost drivers, so they are listed as questions for each Houston bidder. The Houston roof tear-off lines come from this site's guide to reading a roofing estimate, each of which lists its own sources.
- The number of layers on the Houston roof now, written on the quote, since each layer is more material to remove and haul.
- Whether disposal and a nail sweep sit inside the Houston tear-off line or are billed apart.
- Decking repair once the Houston roof is off, priced per sheet so a surprise has a known rate.
- The squares the Houston quote covers, because a tear-off line is only comparable between bids that measure the same roof.
- Underlayment, flashing and drip edge on the Houston roof, replaced or reused, each as its own line.
- Who pulls the permit in Houston and whether the fee is shown.
Sources for this Houston tear-off page: Texas Department of Insurance homeowners losses by county, pulled October 13, 2026. Pull dates are UTC. For this Houston tear-off page, figures are final as published by each source; the permit counts are partial.
Wind Days In The Counties Around Houston
A full replacement begins with a tear-off, and wind is one of the events that starts that work. This block prints what the wind record holds for the 8 counties this site reads around Houston, rather than a claim about any contractor's rate. NOAA's Storm Events Database lists 633 thunderstorm wind reports on 188 days across those counties, from 2010 through June 2, 2026.
A report is one observer or instrument entry. Several reports can describe the same storm, and one storm can cross a county line, so the county rows below add to more than the metro totals.
| County | Reports | Days | Highest gust (knots) | Highest gust (mph) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Harris | 249 | 105 | 90 | 104 |
| Fort Bend | 60 | 37 | 67 | 77 |
| Montgomery | 110 | 55 | 68 | 78 |
| Brazoria | 81 | 37 | 70 | 81 |
| Galveston | 59 | 34 | 72 | 83 |
| Liberty | 39 | 30 | 61 | 70 |
| Waller | 24 | 16 | 70 | 81 |
| Chambers | 11 | 7 | 68 | 78 |
Harris County carries 249 of the 633 reports on 105 days, the most of the eight counties. Montgomery holds 110 reports, Fort Bend 60 and Brazoria 81. Chambers holds the fewest, 11 on 7 days.
The busiest day in the county record is May 16, 2024, with 23 reports across 3 counties and a highest gust of 90 knots, about 104 miles per hour. The file records 85 reports in 2024, more than in any other year it covers.
The file records wind speeds in knots; the miles per hour column multiplies by 1.15078 and rounds the result. Nothing in this file records a tear-off price, a layer count or a square count, which is why this page prints no tear-off price.
Source: NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, the wind entries in the Houston file built on October 9, 2026. The latest record is June 2, 2026. Preliminary: yes for the 2026 entries, which NCEI keeps open until the year is finalized; the earlier years in the file are final.
Questions About Houston Roof Tear-Off Cost
- What does roof tear-off cost in Houston?
- This page prints no tear-off price. The City of Houston open data portal has no per-permit roofing dataset, so there is no declared value to read and no field that records the work inside a job. Ask each Houston bidder to put the tear-off line in writing, with the layer count and the rate.
- Does Houston publish a per-permit roofing file with a job value?
- No. The City of Houston open data portal search on October 13, 2026 found no per-permit roofing dataset and no building permit dataset with a valuation field. The searches for roof and reroof returned no datasets at all, and the building permit search returned one file counted by month and year. There is no declared value for a Houston tear-off to read.
- Does the Houston permit fee cover a tear-off?
- Houston publishes no flat residential re-roof fee that this site could read: the Permitting Center fee calculator opened on October 19, 2026 without stating one. A tear-off line is priced inside a job in Houston, so the fee a bidder shows is the only way to compare that part of two quotes.
- Which Houston-area county had the highest Wind loss per policy in 2025?
- Montgomery County, at $682 of Wind paid per policy, on $117,034,701 paid across 171,529 policies in force (Texas Department of Insurance homeowners losses by county, pulled October 13, 2026). Galveston County is the lowest of the 8 counties listed, at $104 per policy. Those are insurer payments, not a tear-off rate.
Houston ranked roofing companies · Methodology · Cost by metro, compared
How Houston Compares With The Other Texas Metros
On this roof tear-off cost page, Houston is placed against the other Texas metros on two public figures. Houston has no usable declared permit valuation, so it takes no rank on that column. Insurers paid $490 in Wind losses per policy in Harris County in 2025, the lowest of 4 among the 4 metros.
| Metro | Permit valuation median | Rank | Wind loss per policy, 2025 | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| San Antonio | Not sourced | Not ranked | $594 | 3 of 4 |
| Dallas-Fort Worth | $12,198 | 2 of 2 | $885 | 2 of 4 |
| Houston (this page) | Not sourced | Not ranked | $490 | 4 of 4 |
| Austin | $23,150 | 1 of 2 | $897 | 1 of 4 |
Source for the Houston permit column on this roof tear-off cost page: no city file for Houston holds a usable valuation, so the column says Not sourced. Source for the Houston Wind column on this roof tear-off cost page: Texas Department of Insurance homeowners losses by county, Harris County, 2025, file read October 10, 2026. Neither Houston column on this roof tear-off cost page is preliminary, because the cities publish issued permits and the Department marks no year preliminary. In the Houston rows of this roof tear-off cost page, rank 1 is the highest figure, and a permit value is declared by the applicant, so it is not a price.
Cost Pages For This Metro
- Houston roof replacement cost: permit valuations and insurer paid losses.
- Houston metal roof cost: what the public files can and cannot say about metal.
- Houston roof replacement cost per square: the per-square answer, with its sources.
- Roof Replacement Cost By Metro In Texas: how Houston compares with the other Texas metros.
- Repair or replace a Houston roof: what decides between a repair and a full replacement before a Houston bid is signed.
- Spot a storm chaser roofer in Houston: the door-knock, contract and deductible tells to check before a Houston deposit.
- Metal roof or shingles for Houston hail: how impact ratings work, so a Houston metal quote can be compared with a shingle quote.