---
title: "Hail Storm Leads: How to Work Them Under Florida Law"
description: "Hail storm leads for Florida roofers: how to find where hail hit, what Fla. Stat. 489.147 bans in storm solicitations, and why aging-roof lists fill the gaps."
published: "2026-10-28"
canonical: "https://www.theroofidentifier.com/blog/hail-storm-leads"
author: "Everitt Gill"
---

Hail storm leads are homeowners in the path of a reported hail storm, reached by canvass or mail before other roofers get there. In Florida you can work them, but state law bars offering things like a gift card, cash or a deductible waiver for an inspection or a claim. The steadier play pairs storm reports with a list of aging roofs.

Picture a hail report coming in one afternoon out toward Baldwin, on the west side of Duval. By the next morning, every roofer who checks the same public storm map knows which streets to drive. Your canvassers get there and find door hangers already on the knobs. That is the catch with hail as a lead source. The signal is public, so the race starts the minute it posts, and the homeowner hears from three companies before lunch.

None of that makes storm work a bad channel. It makes it a channel you run with a plan, inside the rules, alongside work nobody else is doing.

## How do I know if hail was in my area?

The NOAA Storm Prediction Center publishes storm reports, and its [hail and wind reports go back to 1955](https://www.spc.noaa.gov/climo/online/), so you can check last night's storm and an area's history in the same place.

![Comparison of hail storm leads, which are public, fast and short-lived, with a ranked aging-roof list that keeps crews working between storms.](https://yfvhnfihkflbnivhcgge.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/blog-images/customer-da9bba825f4376e010105504/hail-storm-leads/figure-1.svg)

Use it both ways. The morning after a storm, pull the reports and note which ZIPs have points on the map. That tells you where to send a crew lead to look, not which roofs are damaged. A report marks where hail was seen. Your own eyes on the roofs still decide whether a street is worth knocking.

Then look backward. A ZIP that shows hail reports across several seasons is a ZIP where roofs may have taken more than one hit, and that history belongs on your route sheet.

## How bad does hail damage have to be to replace a roof?

No single hailstone size settles it; an inspection of the roof does, and research shows that small hail can do more to a roof's future than its size suggests.

A 2025 study in [Frontiers in Materials](https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/materials/articles/10.3389/fmats.2025.1603074/full) by Meisenzahl, Giammanco and Hedayati treats hail between 5 mm (graupel) and 25.4 mm, or one inch, as sub-severe. The finding that matters for your sales team: exposure to high concentrations of small hailstones can significantly reduce a roof cover's resistance to later large hail.

Read that from the sales side. A shingle roof that sat through a few small-hail storms may look fine from the curb and still be closer to done than it appears. The storm that finally shows damage can be the last of several, and the roof's age and wear were part of the story the whole time.

That shapes how your crew talks. Lead with the inspection and what it found on that roof. Skip the guesswork about what the last storm did, and leave coverage questions to the homeowner and their insurer.

## Is a hail storm good or bad for a roofing business?

A hail storm is good for demand, because it puts a burst of homeowners in one area thinking about their roofs, but those leads are fast, contested and short-lived.

The bigger risk is quieter. A company that sells mostly off storms goes slow between them. Canvassers sit, mail budgets get cut, and the sales manager waits on the weather. Good storm operators treat hail as one channel with a short window and keep a second pipeline running the rest of the year.

## What can a Florida roofer offer when soliciting after a hail storm?

Under [Florida Statutes 489.147](http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0400-0499/0489/Sections/0489.147.html), a contractor may not offer a residential property owner a rebate, gift, gift card, cash, coupon or insurance deductible waiver in exchange for allowing a roof inspection or making an insurance claim.

The penalty is spelled out in [the same section](http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0400-0499/0489/Sections/0489.147.html): "A contractor may receive up to a $10,000 fine for each violation of this section." A storm promo that seemed harmless at the print shop can cost far more than the jobs it brings in.

Type size has a rule too. If a mailer or email solicits roof claims, the statute's required warnings must run in a font of at least 12 points and at least half as large as the largest font in the piece. Put a 60-point headline on a door hanger and the warnings need to be at least 30 points. Have your attorney look over any storm mailer or script before it goes out.

What stays clean is a pitch about the roof itself. Its age, what your inspector saw, and what a replacement involves are all things your crew knows cold, and none of them needs a gift card attached.

## What should a roofer do between hail storms?

Work a ranked list of homes whose roofs are likely due, so your canvassers and your mail have streets to cover in the weeks when no storm report posts.

Storm reports tell you where hail fell. They do not tell you which roofs on those streets were already near the end, and the sub-severe hail research is a reason to care about that. Say there is a 1990s subdivision in Mandarin where most houses still have their first roof. It is worth a Saturday of knocking whether or not hail touched it last month, and the homeowners there have not called three roofers yet.

The two sources also work better together. When a storm does come through, you already know which homes in its path have the oldest roofs, and you knock those first while competitors work the whole map. On the quiet weeks, the same list keeps your crews in front of homeowners nobody else is working.

Track both channels the same way, by cost per signed job instead of cost per lead. Storm leads and list work cost different amounts to reach, and only the signed-job number tells you which one is paying your crews.

If you want that list for your territory, Roof Identifier will send a free ZIP Roof Report for your ZIP, and Territory Lock keeps your ZIP to one roofer while it is yours.