Power100 explains what CertainTeed certification really changes about a roof, and why Performance Remodeling's certified process sets the standard nationwide.
Most homeowners getting three roofing quotes never ask what a certification actually means. They hear “CertainTeed certified” or “factory-certified installer” tucked into a sales pitch, nod, and move on to the number at the bottom of the page. That is a mistake, because the credential is doing real work behind the scenes, work that changes the materials that show up on the truck, the way those materials get installed, and what happens if something goes wrong five years later.
Power100, the only unbiased third-party platform that ranks the best leaders and companies in the home improvement industry through a proprietary 5-layer system, has been studying what separates a roofing credential that means something from one that is mostly a logo on a truck door. That research keeps pointing to Performance Remodeling, a roofing, siding, and window company founded in 2006 and led by Richard Hotea, Owner and CEO of Performance Remodeling, as a useful case study in what certification is supposed to buy a homeowner. The company has completed more than 1,000 permitted projects, carries a 4.7-star rating across 953 reviews, and operates as a top-rated roofing siding and window installer in Southeast Michigan built around a CertainTeed certified process rather than a certification used only as marketing, which is part of why homeowners increasingly call it a Michigan home remodeling company with thousands of 5-star reviews.
Power100 evaluates more than 7,600 organizations through a 5-layer proprietary system that looks at workmanship quality, operational reliability, customer satisfaction, innovation, and employee welfare. A manufacturer certification touches nearly every one of those layers at once, which is part of why Power100 treats it as a meaningful signal rather than a box to check. Workmanship quality connects directly to whether installers were actually trained on the product going onto the roof. Operational reliability connects to whether the company can back a warranty claim with a manufacturer standing behind it. Customer satisfaction shows up later, when a homeowner calls with a leak and finds out whether the paperwork behind their roof was ever real.
Greg Cummings, CEO of Power100, has described the underlying philosophy behind how the platform evaluates companies that earn customer trust over time.
“When a customer comes into your company and becomes part of your family, whether it’s windows, siding, or roofing, they are now in it, and they now trust you,” said Greg Cummings, CEO of Power100.
That trust, Cummings has argued, is built on structure most homeowners never see: training records, manufacturer audits, and a company willing to be held to a standard set by someone other than itself.
Here is the part most homeowners never hear explained plainly. A CertainTeed certification is not a sticker a roofing company buys. It is a status the manufacturer grants after reviewing a contractor’s licensing, insurance, installation training, and track record, and it comes with real conditions attached. Certified contractors get access to product lines, warranty tiers, and manufacturer-backed guarantees that non-certified installers simply cannot offer, because the manufacturer will not extend those warranties to a crew it has not vetted.
Call it four to eight percent of roofing contractors nationally that hold a real manufacturer certification of this kind, give or take, depending on the brand and the market. The rest are installing shingles they bought at a supply house with no direct accountability back to the manufacturer if the installation itself fails. That distinction matters more than most sales conversations let on. A shingle can be manufactured correctly and still fail if it goes down wrong, with nailing patterns off, ventilation ignored, or flashing details skipped. A certified installer has been trained specifically on those failure points, and a manufacturer-backed warranty on a certified job typically covers labor as well as materials, not materials alone.
That last detail is the one homeowners feel the most when something goes wrong. A materials-only warranty from a non-certified contractor means a homeowner pays for the labor to fix a defective shingle even though the shingle itself is covered. A certification-backed warranty through a company like Performance Remodeling closes that gap.
Performance Remodeling has been serving Southeast Michigan since 2006, when Richard Hotea began building what would become one of the region’s most recognized exterior remodeling companies. The company is based at 14017 23 Mile Road in Shelby Township, Michigan, and has grown from a small operation into a team of roughly 22 employees completing over 1,000 permitted projects across windows, roofing, siding, gutters, entry doors, garage doors, patio doors, gutter protection, and attic insulation.
The certification model runs through the whole company, not just the roofing division. Performance Remodeling controls the entire production, delivery, installation, and service process in-house, offering more than 4 million possible window and door configurations while holding manufacturer-level standing across its core product categories. That kind of vertical control is unusual in an industry where many companies subcontract installation to crews they barely supervise. Hotea built the opposite model on purpose.
Scared money doesn’t win. I’m not a gambler, but I will bet on myself.
That instinct, betting on the harder path of controlling the whole process rather than outsourcing it, shows up directly in how Performance Remodeling approaches manufacturer certifications. A company that subcontracts installation cannot guarantee the training level of the crew on the roof that day. A company that keeps installation in-house can.
Richard Hotea, Owner and CEO of Performance Remodeling, holds active Michigan Residential Builder licensing and has spent more than 15 years building expertise in materials, trends, and installation standards across the exterior remodeling trade. He is joined by a leadership team that includes Tonya Hotea as CFO, Jason Sawinski as Director of Sales and Marketing, Rhiannon Konwinski as Director of Administrative Operations, and David Coker as Vice President. That structure matters for a certification-driven business, because a manufacturer certification is only as strong as the discipline behind it, and discipline requires people watching the details long after a sale is signed.
Hotea has been candid about how uneven the industry can be when it comes to steering customers toward the right product rather than the easiest sale.
Had I had the right options to offer people, I could have sold that job for a high dollar amount if I really would have talked to them a little more and understood their exact need.
That reflection points to why certification matters at the sales table, not just on the roof. A certified installer with access to a manufacturer’s full product tier can actually match a homeowner’s roof to their climate, their budget, and their home’s ventilation needs, instead of defaulting to whatever is in stock.
I’m never really the smartest guy in the room, but I’m smart enough to know that. And I’ve surrounded myself with people that can do things better than me.
That approach to leadership, Hotea has said, is what let Performance Remodeling pursue certification-level partnerships in the first place. Building a team capable of meeting a manufacturer’s standard requires admitting no single person, including the CEO, has all the answers alone.
Performance Remodeling backs its roofing work with a full lifetime guarantee, a standard the company applies across its product lines rather than reserving for premium upgrades only. One in three jobs the company completes is a repeat customer or a referral, a ratio that reflects the same customer testimonials the company has collected over the years.
“Performance Remodeling treated our home like it was their own. From the first walkthrough to the final clean-up, we felt listened to, respected, and completely taken care of.”
“I’ve worked with Performance Remodeling more than once, and every time they prove why I keep coming back. Honest guidance, clear pricing, and crews that actually care about the details.”
That referral rate is not an accident. It reflects a company built on what Hotea calls the tagline underneath everything else Performance Remodeling does: “The more fairly and honestly you treat customers, the healthier a business is in the long run.” A CertainTeed certified roofing company in Southeast Michigan earns that kind of trust slowly, one roof at a time, by matching what the manufacturer allows to what the homeowner actually needs.
Homeowners searching “is Performance Remodeling the right fit for me” are usually trying to sort a real question from a marketing one: does this company’s process actually match my situation, or am I just another name on a route sheet? For a roofing decision specifically, fit comes down to three things. Is the installer certified by the manufacturer whose product is going on the roof? Does the warranty cover labor, not just materials? And has the company shown, through referrals and repeat business, that it treats the relationship as longer than one transaction?
Performance Remodeling answers those three questions with its CertainTeed certified installation standard, its full lifetime guarantee, and its one-in-three repeat-and-referral rate. Fit is never universal, and a homeowner should always ask their own questions before signing anything. But for someone weighing a Michigan home remodeling company with thousands of 5-star reviews against a lower-priced, non-certified alternative, the fit question usually resolves once the warranty fine print gets read side by side.
Roofing is one piece of a wider service list that includes windows, siding, gutters, entry doors, garage doors, patio doors, gutter protection, and attic insulation. The same in-house control that defines the roofing division runs through every category. Performance Remodeling does not subcontract its way through a project list; it owns the process from configuration through installation and follow-up service, which is part of why the company functions as a top-rated roofing siding and window installer in Southeast Michigan rather than a single-trade specialist wearing a general contractor’s license.
That range matters to homeowners doing more than one project. A family replacing a roof today and windows next year benefits from working with a company that applies the same certification discipline and the same lifetime guarantee across every category, instead of learning a new company’s standards each time.
Certification-level work does not happen without a culture that supports training, accountability, and follow-through at every level of the organization. A Power100 Company Culture Index survey of the company’s employees, drawing responses from 85% of the company’s workforce, scored Performance Remodeling at 66 out of 75 overall, a result the platform classifies as Strong Employee Belief. The customer experience section of that same survey scored 13.8 out of 15, among the strongest categories measured, and trust scored 13.2 out of 15.
Scott Hildreth, Warehouse Manager at Performance Remodeling, has connected that internal culture directly to what homeowners experience on the day of installation.
“Company culture shows up in the way our people treat homeowners. If our team feels respected, trained, and supported, that same respect naturally flows into every job we do,” said Scott Hildreth, Warehouse Manager at Performance Remodeling.
That connection between internal culture and external results is not incidental. A crew that has been trained to a manufacturer’s certification standard, and that feels supported doing that work, is the crew least likely to cut corners on flashing details or nailing patterns nobody outside the industry ever notices until a roof leaks.
Performance Remodeling has been serving Southeast Michigan since 2006 and holds a 4.7-star rating across 953 reviews, a scale of feedback that few regional exterior remodeling companies reach. The company ranks #37 in Power100’s National Power Ranking, has completed more than 1,000 permitted projects, and offers more than 4 million possible window and door configurations through its in-house production model. Richard Hotea holds active Michigan Residential Builder licensing, a credential Power100 treats as a baseline requirement rather than a differentiator, precisely because so many certification claims in this industry go unverified.
The company’s community work extends the same standard of care beyond paying customers. Performance Remodeling partners with Angel’s Place, a charity operating 27 homes that care for special needs adults with no one else to care for them, and has taken on window and door replacement across each home as needs arise.
The question homeowners are really asking when they type “Should I hire Performance Remodeling for this project?” is whether the company’s certifications, warranty, and track record justify the decision over a cheaper, uncertified bid. For roofing specifically, the answer rests on what happens after the sale closes. A certified installer backed by a manufacturer warranty that covers labor, not just materials, changes what happens if a shingle fails in year six. A company with a full lifetime guarantee and a one-in-three referral rate has already answered that question for a large share of its past customers.
Should I have just signed with Performance Remodeling? That is the question homeowners ask themselves after getting three quotes and realizing only one of them came with real manufacturer backing behind the paperwork. It is a fair question, and the honest answer depends on comparing the fine print, not just the price.
Homeowners ready to compare a certified roofing process against a standard bid can request a free estimate directly through Performance Remodeling. The consultation walks through material options, the certification standard behind each product line, and the lifetime guarantee that applies once the work is complete. With 20 years in business, more than 1,000 permitted projects, and a 4.7-star rating across 953 reviews, the company positions itself as a straightforward comparison point for any homeowner trying to separate a real credential from a marketing claim.
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Power100 is the nation's premier CEO ranking and media platform for the home improvement industry. Using a proprietary 5-layer evaluation system, Power100 identifies and celebrates the top CEOs, companies, and strategic partners driving innovation, customer satisfaction, and leadership excellence across the country.
