What does each covering cost per year of service?
Divide installed cost by expected life, and the ranking inverts. Using 2026 Texas installed prices and realistic service lives for this climate:
- Architectural asphalt: $5.00–$9.50 per square foot over 18–25 years — roughly $0.28 per square foot per year at mid-range.
- Impact-resistant asphalt: $5.40–$8.64 over 20–30 years — roughly $0.28 per square foot per year.
- Screw-down steel panel: $7.00–$12.00 over 30–45 years — roughly $0.25 per square foot per year.
- Standing seam metal: $8.00–$14.00 over 40–60 years — roughly $0.22 per square foot per year.
The spread is narrower than the sticker prices suggest. Metal wins on the long view and asphalt wins on the cheque written this month.
Who does the long view actually suit?
An owner staying put, and a building nobody wants to re-roof twice. A family home held for thirty years recovers a standing seam premium in service life. A house being sold in five recovers it in resale value, and that credit varies with the buyer rather than being guaranteed.
Outbuildings sit differently. A barn, shop or equipment shed takes screw-down panel over purlins with no decking and no underlayment underneath it, which is the cheapest roof square footage available on a Washington County property. The aesthetics argument that keeps metal off some houses does not apply to a hay barn.
Is a metal roof loud?
Over solid decking with underlayment, no. Over open purlins on a barn, yes. The memory people carry of rain drumming on tin comes from agricultural buildings with nothing between the steel and the air below it.
A house re-roofed in metal gets panels over a solid deck, high-temperature synthetic underlayment and an insulated attic beneath. Measured from inside a bedroom, that assembly reads close to asphalt. The noise question belongs to the barn, and on a barn nobody minds.
What about hail on metal?
Steel dents at the stone sizes Washington County records, and keeps shedding water. The county's largest recorded stone was 1.50 inches at Burton in 2025. That size fractures the mat on aged asphalt and leaves a dent in metal panel.
The insurance consequence differs accordingly. Fractured asphalt is functional damage and usually a covered replacement. Dented metal is cosmetic, and cosmetic damage exclusions on metal roofs are common in Texas policies. Read that clause before choosing metal on hail grounds specifically.
The practical split for a rural property
- House: standing seam where the budget allows and the stay is long; architectural asphalt otherwise.
- Barn, shop, equipment shed: 26 gauge screw-down panel over purlins, every time.
- The tear-off underneath either one: the same deck assessment and re-sheeting applies whichever covering goes back on.
- Porch and low-slope additions: neither shingle nor exposed-fastener panel. A low pitch needs a membrane or a standing seam profile rated for it.
Prices for all of these sit on the 2026 price table, and the system comparison is on standing seam and R-panel.