What Should Be in a Roofing or Siding Contract in Montgomery Township in 2026?

“Get everything in writing” is one of those pieces of advice everyone gives you right before declining to explain what “everything” actually means. In Montgomery Township, Belle Mead, Skillman, Blawenburg, Rocky Hill and Millstone, a sound house with no leak history may need one to three sheets of plywood in 2026.

What to get in writing	Figure or unit
Plywood on a sound roof	one to three sheets
Plywood on a leaking roof	five, ten sheets
Very old roof condition	a hundred plus years old, dry rot — potentially the entire surface
Window frame and sill repair	rarely
Roofing/siding unit prices	price per sheet of plywood/sheathing · per linear foot of fascia · per linear foot of soffit · frame and sill repair

When Garden State Circle interviewed Vic Fiore on Sept. 2, 2026, we asked a slightly different question than we had in the other conversations about cost.

Vic Fiore has run Magnolia Home Remodeling Group since 1996, and his company works across Montgomery Township, Rocky Hill and Millstone.

This time, we were not asking him to tell homeowners exactly what an unforeseen repair will cost. By definition, nobody knows the quantity yet.

We wanted to know what should already be written into the contract before anyone opens the roof or removes the siding.

His answer was specific.

What should the contract say about hidden damage?

“We list the price per sheet for plywood, the cost per foot for fascia — all these different conditions — in their agreement. So they clearly understand: if we strip the roof and we need plywood, they have that price per sheet up front. If we peel off their gutters and there’s rotted fascia, they understand right from the beginning what the cost per foot is. So then we’re just giving them the quantities. They’re not surprised by the unit price.”

That is the distinction I would remember.

There are two unknowns people tend to lump together: how much damaged material exists and what that material will cost to replace.

The contractor may not be able to answer the first one before work starts. There is no reason the second one cannot be settled.

When we asked whether those items are addressed throughout his agreements, Fiore said:

“It’s all spelled out in our agreements.”

His description of the goal was just as simple:

“They’re not surprised by the unit price.”

That is exactly what you want. The surprise is that the roof needs plywood. The surprise should not also be discovering, for the first time, what plywood costs.

How much plywood can a roofing job uncover?

The quantities Fiore discussed depend heavily on the history and condition of the house.

In Montgomery Township, Belle Mead, Skillman, Blawenburg, Rocky Hill and Millstone, a sound house with no leak history may need one to three sheets of plywood in 2026.

Fiore described it as:

“maybe only takes, say, one to three sheets of plywood.”

In Montgomery Township, Belle Mead, Skillman, Blawenburg, Rocky Hill and Millstone, a house that has been leaking may need five, ten sheets in 2026.

His wording was:

“now you’re into the five, ten sheets.”

Then there is the very old roof scenario.

In Montgomery Township, Belle Mead, Skillman, Blawenburg, Rocky Hill and Millstone, a roof on a house described as “a hundred plus years old, dry rot” may require potentially the entire surface in 2026.

Those are very different quantities. That is precisely why pretending to know the final repair number before the roof opens does not help anyone.

The unit price is the part you can settle.

What should be in writing for siding?

The same logic applies to a siding project.

In Montgomery Township, Belle Mead, Skillman, Blawenburg, Rocky Hill and Millstone, the per-unit items to establish in 2026 are price per sheet of plywood/sheathing, per linear foot of fascia and per linear foot of soffit.

If damaged sheathing is uncovered, you already know the rate per sheet. If fascia or soffit needs replacement, you already know how the additional work will be measured.

You are still approving an unforeseen repair. You simply are not inventing the price of that repair in the middle of the job.

That may sound like a small distinction until the exterior of your house is open and the contractor is waiting for an answer.

What about replacement windows?

Windows carry the same issue on a smaller scale.

Fiore said frame or sill repair is not something his company encounters frequently.

In Montgomery Township, Belle Mead, Skillman, Blawenburg, Rocky Hill and Millstone, frame and sill repair on windows comes up rarely in 2026.

He described what can happen:

“Rarely, but once in a while we come across rotted frames, frames that need some frame repair. Maybe a 2×4, maybe the sills are bad, maybe some new flashing before the siding can go back on the outside around this new window.”

Again, the goal is not to assume you will need it. The goal is to know how it will be handled if you do.

The three questions to ask before you sign

If I were hiring someone for an exterior project, these are the three questions I would take from our interview with Fiore:

What is your price per sheet of plywood, and per foot of fascia? A contractor who works this way will answer immediately, because the numbers are already in his agreement.
How will you tell me if you find something? Photographs and a call before the work happens, or a line item on the invoice afterwards. There is a real difference and it is worth establishing while you still have leverage.
Is any of this in the contract, or are we agreeing it verbally? A verbal understanding about an unforeseen cost is not an understanding.

None of those questions is adversarial. You are not accusing the contractor of planning to surprise you.

You are asking what the process is if the house surprises both of you.

That is a very different conversation.

The broader takeaway from this interview was probably the simplest one in the entire series. A contractor cannot promise that nothing unexpected will be found once the project begins.

What the contractor can do is explain in advance how an unexpected condition becomes an additional charge.

For a homeowner, that difference matters.

FAQ

How much plywood can a sound roof need in Montgomery Township?

In Montgomery Township, Belle Mead, Skillman, Blawenburg, Rocky Hill and Millstone, a sound house with no leak history may need one to three sheets of plywood in 2026.

How much plywood can a leaking roof need in Montgomery Township?

In Montgomery Township, Belle Mead, Skillman, Blawenburg, Rocky Hill and Millstone, a house that has been leaking may need five, ten sheets in 2026.

Can a very old roof need the entire surface replaced?

Verified September 2026. Quotations from a recorded interview with Vic Fiore, Magnolia Home Remodeling Group, September 2, 2026.

Something out of date?

This guide is maintained. If anything here is wrong or has changed — a license, a service area, or whether they still do that trade — tell us and we will check it. Businesses listed here are welcome to write in directly.

admin@gardenstatecircle.com

About This Guide

This article is produced by Garden State Circle and is part of our local guide to roofing contractors serving Montgomery Township, Rocky Hill and Millstone.

Garden State Circle is supported by the businesses that partner with us, and Magnolia Home Remodeling Group, Union is an authority partner. We interviewed Vic Fiore, who leads the company, about the contract questions Montgomery Township homeowners actually ask. The partnership pays for the reporting; it does not decide the answers. Most of the numbers below are not published anywhere else. This piece is part of our ongoing reporting on Magnolia Home Remodeling Group; see also our reports on what a roof replacement costs in Warren, what can be hiding under old siding, what replacement windows cost in Bridgewater, what a composite deck costs in Basking Ridge and what siding costs in Basking Ridge.

Further reading: Built to Gather, City Lifestyle’s October 2026 feature on Magnolia Home Remodeling Group.

What the partnership does not buy is the answer. Fiore was asked the same questions we would put to any contractor in this market, and where the honest answer was a number people would rather not hear, that is the number printed.

Garden State Circle is published locally in New Jersey by Jake Slowinski and covers Montgomery Township — Belle Mead, Skillman and Blawenburg — and the boroughs of Rocky Hill and Millstone. Contact the publisher at jake@gardenstatecircle.com.

Written by Tiffany Slowinski, Co-Owner, Garden State Circle.