Every day you are faced with decision after decision about the maintenance of your home. Roofing should be the least of your worries, Right? You bought 30 year shingles didn't you?

You may have even bought algae resistant shingles. Now why do you have algae streaks and stains on your Jackson Tennessee roof? The answer is simple, the shingles have a 30 year warranty but more than likely the warranty for algae resistance ends at the 10 year mark.

Now that you have the algae stains you now need to decide what to do about it. You have 2 choices, one is to replace your roof and the other is to have the shingles cleaned. Well if you are like me I want to get all that I can out of something before I throw it away. So it is that I would have my shingles cleaned. There is nothing wrong with them except that they are covered with algae.

In the last year from March 2008 to March 2009 shingle prices have risen by 57.5% according to the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics' Producer Price Index. This year, they went up 3.8 percent from February to March alone.

Now let's look at replacement cost. A typical 1200 square foot house will require roughly 14 squares of shingles (100 square feet per square) and a tear off and new roof installation can cost upwards of $4,000.

Now that we know what it costs to replace the roof let's look at the cleaning costs. For that same roof, the cleaning costs would normally be around 1/10 of the replacement costs. For this specific example the cleaning of your Jackson TN roof would be approximately $300. That is a savings of $3,700 for the homeowner.