Recent skylight work
New York Skylight Installers replaces, installs and supplies skylights in Staten Island houses, cottages and rowhouses. Official VELUX dealer, LIC# 2084179, skylights only since 2005.
New Dorp is one of the oldest settlements on the island and the housing shows it in layers. Nineteen twenties and thirties brick and stucco houses, a lot of them semi attached in pairs, postwar infill on the side streets, and the odd much older frame house that the rest was built around. The semi attached pairs are the ones that change how a skylight job runs.
On a semi attached house the roof is shared along a party wall, and the skylight is usually over the stair or over an interior bathroom close to that wall. Two things follow from that. The flashing detail where the roof meets the party wall or a parapet is where water sits, so it gets a proper lapped metal detail rather than sealant. And if the work touches the shared line at all, the neighbour needs to know before the crew turns up rather than when they hear the noise. We raise that at the assessment because it is easier to settle in advance than to argue on the day.
The stair skylight in these houses is often the only daylight the middle of the house gets, and on a house divided into two the landing goes dark the moment it is covered over. A replacement on a curb that is still sound is $2,287 installed, with the $1,760 standard replacement labor already in that number. Where the curb has been built up through several roofs and gone soft at the corners it gets rebuilt first, priced once we have seen it.
The bathroom skylight is the other common one. Small unit, flat or shallow roof above it, and usually a trail of staining on the ceiling that the owner has repainted twice. A manual venting unit on a flat roof is $1,092 installed and on a pitched roof $1,295, and the venting is worth having in a bathroom because it moves the moisture that caused half the staining in the first place.
There is no designated historic district over the residential streets we work on in New Dorp, so the Landmarks step does not normally arise here the way it does in St. George, though an individually designated building anywhere on the island would still be its own case. Where there is any doubt about an address we check it before anything is ordered. The rules are set out on our NYC permits and landmark rules page.
Leaking skylight in New Dorp? Start with a professional assessment from New York's original skylight specialists. Skylights are all we have done since 2005: licensed and insured (LIC# 2084179), VELUX Trained & Approved, an official VELUX dealer, 4.9 stars on Google, and a 10-Year No Leak Warranty on every unit we install. Roofers and handymen do skylights on the side; we are the specialists the roofers call. Water dripping from the skylight, a stain on the ceiling under it, a drip that only shows up in a heavy rain: none of that tells you what actually failed. We come out, find the real cause, and give you a straight answer and a price for the right fix, which is usually a new unit. Active leaks go to the front of the schedule. Read more about skylight repair on Staten Island.
Not to a skylight on your own roof plane, but the practical answer is that they should be told. The roof is shared along a party wall, the crew and the ladder are visible and audible, and the flashing detail at the party line is right next to their side. It is a short conversation in advance and it saves a difficult one on the day.
It might not be. On a semi attached roof the meeting of the roof and the party wall or parapet is where water sits longest, and a failed detail there drips in close enough to the skylight to look like the skylight. We trace where the water is actually entering rather than assuming the nearest opening is the cause.
A straight replacement on a sound curb is a one day job and the opening is never left open overnight. If the curb has to be rebuilt it can run into a second day, and in that case the opening is closed and made watertight at the end of the first day before anyone leaves.
In a bathroom it is very often condensation rather than a leak, because warm wet air hits cold glass and runs back in at the edges. The giveaway is staining that appears after a shower rather than after rain. A venting unit helps, because it moves the moisture out instead of leaving it to find the coldest surface in the room.
A straight replacement of an existing unit on an existing curb generally does not need one. Cutting a new opening changes the roof structure and that is a different matter. There is no designated historic district over the residential streets we normally work on here, so the Landmarks step does not usually arise, but we confirm an address before anything is ordered rather than assuming.
The skylight work is on the roof, not the wall, so the stucco is only at risk where a ladder or staging bears against it. We pad and position so it does not, and where a parapet is stuccoed and already cracked we point that out before we start so nobody is wondering afterwards who did it.
St. George · Tottenville · Great Kills · Todt Hill
We cover every part of the borough. See skylights on Staten Island, our published prices, or NYC permits and landmark rules. Serving 10306.