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How much does insurance cost for a roofing contractor?

Workers' comp is the line that sets a roofing company's insurance budget. Ohio's state fund charges a base rate of $5.7709 per $100 of payroll for roofing (class 5551, from July 1, 2026), and Washington charges $5.793 per hour worked for roof work (class 0507, 2026). Both are official rates. Roofing ranks 16th highest of Ohio's 501 classes and 14th of Washington's 320 (our count). No insurer publishes a roofer-specific general liability figure in our data. The closest are ERGO NEXT's customer averages for contractors, such as $210 a month for general contractors (April 2026).

Checked against 28 sources Last reviewed How we check figures
Contents8 sections

Key takeaways

  • Ohio's roofing base rate, $5.7709 per $100 of payroll, is 124 times its clerical rate and 1.7 times the rate for carpentry on one- and two-family homes (our calculation from the July 1, 2026 schedule)⁠1.
  • Washington bills roofing comp by the hour: $5.793 for each hour worked in 2026, of which about $1.00 may be withheld from the worker's wages⁠4.
  • In California a C-39 roofing license requires workers' comp even if you have no employees. If coverage lapses, the license is suspended⁠7⁠8.
  • License insurance minimums for roofers differ by state. Florida asks for $100,000 liability and $25,000 property damage, Illinois $500,000/$250,000 and Minnesota $100,000/$300,000 plus $25,000. Texas has no state roofing license at all⁠12⁠15⁠16⁠19.
  • No insurer in our data publishes a roofer-specific general liability price. ERGO NEXT's contractor averages ($145 to $210 a month, April 2026) are the nearest published figures. Your quote will be driven by your payroll and the share of work at height⁠21⁠22.

Quick facts

Ohio roofing (5551)$5.7709 per $100 payroll, from July 1, 2026⁠1
Washington roof work (0507)$5.793 per hour worked, 2026⁠4
Wyoming specialty trades (238000)$2.39 per $100 payroll, 2026; no separate roofing class⁠5
Construction comp cost, BLS$1.10 per hour worked, June 2026 (all private industry: $0.43)⁠6
California C-39Comp required with or without employees ⁠7
Roofer license bondsCA $25,000; IL $10,000/$25,000; MN $15,000; WA $15,000 ⁠10⁠14⁠16⁠18

State-fund base rates are before experience modification. Insurer figures describe each company's own customers.

Why roofing comp sits near the top of the rate schedules

Workers’ compensation is priced per class of work. Roofing is classed on its own, apart from general carpentry or remodeling, so a roofer cannot average its rate down with lower-hazard building work. In Ohio, Florida and other states that use NCCI-based codes, it is class 5551, “Roofing – All Kinds and Drivers”⁠1⁠3. Washington and Wyoming use their own systems⁠4⁠5.

Ohio, Washington and Wyoming run monopolistic state funds that publish the rate itself, not just a loss cost:

Official workers’ compensation base rates for this work in the three state-fund states that publish them
StateClassDescriptionBase rateEffective
Ohio5551ROOFING – ALL KINDS AND DRIVERS$5.7709 per $1001 Jul 2026
Washington0507Roof Work - Construction and Repair$5.793 per hour1 Jan 2026
Wyoming238000Specialty Trade Contractors$2.39 per $1001 Jan 2026

Base rates set by the state fund before experience modification. Ohio and Wyoming charge per $100 of payroll; Washington charges per hour worked, and part is withheld from wages. Other states’ insurers file their own rates; see where rates are published.

In context:

  • Ohio. At $5.7709 per $100 of payroll, 5551 is 124 times the clerical class 8810 ($0.0466). It is 1.7 times class 5645, carpentry on detached one- and two-family dwellings ($3.4595), and 3.4 times carpentry NOC 5403 ($1.7131). These are our calculations from the schedule effective July 1, 2026⁠1.
  • Washington. Class 0507, “Roof Work – Construction and Repair”, costs $5.793 for every hour a roofer works in 2026. That is about twice class 0516, building repair and carpentry NOC ($2.9469), and 26 times clerical class 4904 ($0.2223)⁠4. Washington charges per hour, not per dollar of payroll, so a higher-paid roofer costs the same to insure as an apprentice.
  • Wyoming. Wyoming’s NAICS-based schedule has no roofing line. Roofing contractors fall in 238000, Specialty Trade Contractors, at $2.39 per $100 in 2026, alongside every other specialty trade⁠5. Wyoming law lists construction as extrahazardous employment, so coverage is compulsory⁠27, and the state fund is the only place to buy it⁠5.

In most other states, private insurers file their own rates on top of bureau loss costs. The class code is the same, but the rate per $100 differs by insurer and state. See where official rates are published and the class code guide.

What the BLS cost-per-hour figures show

The Bureau of Labor Statistics does not publish a roofing-only figure. Its June 2026 Employer Costs for Employee Compensation survey puts construction employers’ workers’ comp at $1.10 per hour worked, or 2.1% of total compensation. That is 2.6 times the $0.43 average for all private industry (our calculation)⁠6. The construction figure averages roofers with lower-rated trades and office staff, so a roofing-only firm’s cost per hour is likely to sit above it.

Employer cost per hour worked for workers’ compensation and health insurance, June 2026
GroupWorkers’ comp per hourComp, % of total pay and benefitsHealth insurance per hour
All private industry workers$0.430.9%$3.48
Construction$1.102.1%$3.71
Manufacturing$0.491.0%$4.43
Trade, transportation, and utilities$0.541.4%$3.01
Information$0.420.5%$7.37
Financial activities$0.230.3%$5.97
Professional and business services$0.360.6%$4.11
Education and health services$0.300.6%$3.70
Leisure and hospitality$0.271.2%$0.84
Other services (except public administration)$0.350.9%$2.34
Goods-producing$0.731.5%$4.16
Service-providing$0.370.8%$3.34

Average employer cost per employee hour worked for workers' compensation and for health insurance, averaged across all workers in the group, plus workers' compensation as a percent of total compensation. Group averages mix high- and low-risk jobs, so they are not a premium rate for any single business. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), National Compensation Survey, June 2026 (2026 Q2), private industry workers, released 9 Sep 2026.

Turning a roofing rate into a premium

The formula is the same everywhere: exposure (payroll or hours) times the class rate, times your experience modification, plus state assessments and minus any discounts. The examples below are our calculations with stated assumptions, using official 2026 rates. They are not quotes.

  1. Ohio, $300,000 of roofing payroll

    $300,000 ÷ 100 × $5.7709 = $17,312.70 a year at the base rate⁠1. An employer whose expected losses reach $2,000 is experience-rated, and its rate is the base rate times its experience modification⁠2. With a 1.20 mod, the same payroll costs $20,775.24. With a 0.85 mod, it costs $14,715.80.

  2. Washington, six roofers working 1,800 hours each

    10,800 hours × $5.793 = $62,564.40 a year. Of that, $1.0034 an hour, or $10,836.72, is the worker share that may be deducted from wages, leaving the employer about $51,727.68⁠4.

  3. Wyoming, $300,000 of payroll

    $300,000 ÷ 100 × $2.39 = $7,170 before the employer’s experience factor⁠5.

The gap between the Ohio and Wyoming results comes from how the classes are drawn. Ohio prices roofing alone; Wyoming pools it with every specialty trade. Neither figure is a national price.

How the mod is calculated from your own claims, and how much one serious injury can move it, is explained in the experience modification rate guide. How auditors check payroll by class after the policy year is covered in premium audits.

Insurer-reported comp figures exist only at the level of “construction”. ERGO NEXT reports a $160 monthly average for its construction customers (data updated April 2026). The disclosure on that page refers to commercial property buyers, apparently a copy error⁠23. A one-person roofing business and a 20-person commercial crew both sit inside that average, so it says little about your own premium.

What the license requires, state by state

Several states make insurance or a bond a condition of the roofing license itself. A lapse then stops you from working legally, not just from bidding on certain jobs. These are the rules we confirmed at the boards and in the statutes on October 13, 2026:

Insurance and bond conditions of a roofing license in six states (checked October 13, 2026)
State License Workers’ comp Liability insurance minimum Bond
California CSLB C-39 Roofing Required even with no employees⁠7 None set in the rules cited here $25,000 contractor bond⁠10
Florida CILB roofing contractor Construction employers with 1+ employee; up to 3 owner-officers may opt out⁠13 $100,000 liability, $25,000 property damage⁠12 None found in CILB rules checked
Illinois IDFPR roofing contractor Must cover employees⁠14 $500,000 per occurrence bodily injury, $250,000 property damage⁠15 $10,000 limited, $25,000 unlimited license⁠14
Minnesota DLI residential roofer Comp certificate, or a written exemption statement, filed with the application⁠17 $100,000 per occurrence / $300,000 aggregate bodily injury plus $25,000 property damage, or $300,000 single limit⁠16 $15,000⁠16
Washington L&I specialty contractor registration State fund, by the hour⁠4 $200,000 public liability plus $50,000 property damage, or $250,000 combined single limit⁠18 $15,000 specialty contractor⁠18
Texas No state roofing license⁠19 Elective, except on public construction contracts⁠20 None at state level None at state level

Scroll the table sideways to see every column.

Points that change what you buy:

  • California. Business and Professions Code 7125 lets a contractor with no employees file an exemption, but it bars that exemption for C-39 roofing (along with C-8, C-20, C-22 and D-49)⁠8. For licenses that already combined C-39 with other classifications on January 1, 2013, the statute had the registrar remove the C-39 classification, instead of suspending the whole license, if no comp certificate was received⁠8. The state’s workers’ comp division puts it plainly: a roofer with no employees “is still required to carry workers’ compensation insurance”⁠9. For a sole owner, that means buying a policy with no one else on the payroll. A lapse suspends the license, and any work done while it is suspended counts as unlicensed⁠7. As written, section 7125 is repealed on January 1, 2028 unless a later law extends it⁠8. SB 291, which CSLB lists among the laws taking effect in 2026, raises penalties for comp violations and requires CSLB to develop a process to verify comp exemption eligibility and report to the Legislature by 2027⁠11.
  • Florida. Florida covers construction employment from the first employee, against four for most other industries. Corporate officers can opt out only if each owns at least 10% of the company, and no more than three may do so⁠13. The Construction Industry Licensing Board’s insurance minimum for roofing contractors, $100,000 liability and $25,000 property damage, is a third of the $300,000 it sets for general and building contractors⁠12.
  • Illinois. The license requires proof of comp “for roofing” covering employees. The company’s qualifying party must be a W-2 employee who is covered by comp; a 1099 arrangement does not qualify⁠14. The $500,000 bodily-injury minimum is the highest of the states in this table⁠15.
  • Minnesota. The license covers residential roofing on one- to four-family homes: coverings, sheathing, weatherproofing and repair, but not new roof systems⁠26. The required policy must include products and completed operations coverage, which is the part of GL that responds to a leak or collapse after the job is finished⁠16.
  • Texas. Texas does not license reroofing contractors. A 2025 bill to have TDLR license them, H.B. 3344, was reported by a House committee in May 2025 and got no further⁠19⁠28. Private employers may choose not to carry comp. A roofer working on a public building or construction contract, however, must certify comp coverage for every employee on the project, and so must each subcontractor⁠20.

The state hubs for California, Florida, Illinois, Minnesota, Washington and Texas cover each state’s wider comp system. The workers’ comp requirements table shows the employee threshold in all 51 jurisdictions.

General liability: how a roofer is rated without a published price

None of the insurers and brokers in our data publishes a general liability figure for roofers. The figures that come closest are for other contracting trades:

Premiums insurers report for this type of business
CoveragePublisherFigurePremiumPublished
General liabilityERGO NEXTAverage (Carpenter)$145/modata updated April 2026
General liabilityERGO NEXTAverage (General contractor)$210/modata updated April 2026
Commercial autoProgressive CommercialMedian (Contractors)$203/mo2025 data (page undated)
Commercial autoProgressive CommercialAverage (Contractors)$260/mo2025 data (page undated)

Insurer- and broker-reported figures from each company’s own customers, as published on its website; not a random sample of all businesses. Figures are rounded as published.

These are ERGO NEXT averages for its own general contractor and carpenter customers and Progressive’s 2025 per-vehicle figures for contractors⁠22⁠24. A roofing account is not in either group, and neither company says where roofers would fall. Use them as an outside reference, not as a roofer’s price.

What sets the roofer’s GL price:

  • Payroll as the exposure base. In ISO’s general liability program, “payroll is the ISO General Liability premium base for most contracting and service risks”⁠21. The insurer applies a rate per unit of payroll for the roofing class, so a firm that doubles its crew roughly doubles its GL exposure before any discount. Verisk’s size-of-risk research found that loss cost per unit of exposure falls as payroll grows; it began filing a Size of Risk Rating Supplement in July 2021 that insurers licensing its program can use to reflect this⁠21.
  • The class the insurer picks. The rate per unit of payroll depends on the classification the insurer assigns. Ask each insurer which class and premium base it used, so you can compare quotes on the same footing. Then check that the year-end audit uses the same class.
  • Completed operations. Damage from a leak that appears after the job is finished falls under the products-completed operations part of the policy. Minnesota requires it as a license condition⁠16.

The general liability guide explains premium bases, contract limits and additional-insured endorsements.

Trucks, tools and bonds

  • Commercial auto. Roofing crews run trucks and trailers loaded with materials. Progressive Commercial reports a 2025 median of $203 a month per vehicle for its contractor customers and an average of $260, for new policies with no driver violations⁠24. Progressive lists industry, location, vehicle age and type, driving history, coverage needs, and limits and deductibles as the factors that set its price⁠24; see commercial auto.
  • Tools and equipment. GL pays for damage to other people’s property, not your own. Ladders, hoists, nailers and stored materials need their own coverage, such as a contractor’s equipment floater; see inland marine.
  • License bonds. The bond amounts in the table above are set by statute: $25,000 in California, $15,000 in Minnesota and Washington, and $10,000 or $25,000 in Illinois⁠10⁠14⁠16⁠18. A license bond is not insurance for the roofer: California’s is filed for the benefit of consumers harmed by defective construction or license-law violations and of employees owed wages⁠10. Each surety sets its own bond premium; none of the official sources here publishes those rates.
  • Contract bonds. Federal construction contracts above $150,000 require performance and payment bonds under 40 U.S.C. chapter 31, subchapter III (formerly the Miller Act), and contracts from $35,000 to $150,000 require other payment protections⁠25. A roofer bidding on schools or government buildings needs bonding capacity as well as insurance; see surety bonds.

Building a roofing insurance budget

No published figure gives a roofing company’s total insurance cost, and no honest total can be given without your payroll, state and loss history. To build a figure you can check against quotes:

  1. Split payroll by class

    Roofing labor, office staff, and any sales or estimating staff who stay off roofs. Only the first group goes in the roofing class. In Washington, track hours instead.

  2. Apply your state’s comp rate

    In Ohio, Washington and Wyoming, use the official rate above. Elsewhere, ask for the class code and rate the insurer used, and its loss-cost multiplier. Multiply by your experience mod if you have one.

  3. Add the license minimums as floors, not targets

    Your state’s minimums from the table set the lowest limits you can carry. A customer’s contract can require more.

  4. Price GL on the same payroll

    Ask each insurer what exposure base and class it used, and whether completed operations are included.

  5. Add vehicles, equipment and bonds separately

    Each is priced on its own base: vehicles and drivers, equipment values, and bond amount and credit.

The premium calculation guide explains each step, and the workers’ comp estimator runs the comp arithmetic with official rates.

Sources

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