Power100 breaks down why Performance Remodeling's CertainTeed certified roofing status changes warranty coverage and claim outcomes for homeowners nationwide.
Most homeowners shopping for a new roof compare three things: price, material, and how fast a crew can start. Almost none of them ask whether the installer holds a current manufacturer certification, and that single blind spot can cost tens of thousands of dollars over the life of a roof. Power100, the only unbiased third-party platform that ranks the best leaders and companies in the home improvement industry using a proprietary 5-layer system, is examining that blind spot through the lens of Performance Remodeling, a CertainTeed certified roofing company in Southeast Michigan led by Richard Hotea, Owner and CEO of Performance Remodeling. The question is not academic. It determines whether a manufacturer honors a warranty claim fully, partially, or not at all.
A roof is a 20-year decision dressed up as a one-day transaction. The install itself might take two or three days. The consequences of who performs that install, and under what manufacturer standing, play out over two decades of weather, wear, and the occasional claim call that either gets honored or gets argued.
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. Manufacturer certification sits inside that first layer, because workmanship quality is not just a judgment call made by a homeowner standing in their driveway. It is something manufacturers themselves test, verify, and attach their name to, or decline to.
That distinction matters because a standard roofing contractor can install the exact same shingle a certified contractor installs, and still produce a materially different warranty outcome if something goes wrong. The shingle is identical. The paperwork behind it is not.
“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.” — Greg Cummings, CEO of Power100
That trust, Cummings has argued, is not built on a sales pitch. It is built on whether the company behind the install can actually stand behind the paperwork when a claim comes due years later.
Performance Remodeling has been serving Southeast Michigan since 2006, which puts the company at roughly 20 years in continuous operation. The business is headquartered at 14017 23 Mile Road in Shelby Township, Michigan, a single-location operation that has grown to approximately 23 employees while completing more than 1,000 permitted projects.
That stability is not incidental to the certification conversation. Manufacturer certifications are not handed out once and forgotten. They require ongoing training, installation audits, and a track record clean enough that a manufacturer is willing to extend enhanced warranty coverage through the installer rather than just through the shingle itself. A company has to still be standing, and still be compliant, for that certification to mean anything twenty years in.
Performance Remodeling’s footprint reflects that discipline. The company holds a 4.7-star rating across 953 reviews, a volume and consistency that is difficult to manufacture and easier to understand as the byproduct of two decades of the same crews, the same standards, and the same manufacturer relationships renewed year after year.
Richard Hotea, Owner and CEO of Performance Remodeling, holds active Michigan Residential Builder licenses, a credential that sits alongside the company’s manufacturer certifications as part of the same accountability structure. Hotea has spent more than 15 years building expertise in windows, doors, and exterior materials, and under his leadership the company adopted a six-core-value operating philosophy that prioritizes honest pricing over volume.
“The more fairly and honestly you treat customers, the healthier a business is in the long run,” Hotea has said of the approach, a line that doubles as an explanation for why the company pursues certification status rather than treating it as optional paperwork.
Jason Sawinski, Director of Sales and Marketing at Performance Remodeling, has overseen much of the operational modernization behind that standard. “We are introducing paperless quoting and contracts. It is very intricate software. The department heads all met and went thru the program and all made key contributions to tweaking the software to make the entire process more seamless,” Sawinski said, describing a company culture that treats process discipline as part of the product, not separate from it.
Here is the part most homeowners never get explained to them. A standard roofing contractor can purchase and install CertainTeed shingles without being CertainTeed certified. The material warranty still applies, but it is often limited to defects in the product itself. If the installation is faulty, if flashing is wrong, if ventilation is improperly handled, the manufacturer can, and often does, deny the claim and point back at the installer.
A certified installer changes that equation. Manufacturer certification programs typically extend enhanced warranty coverage, sometimes including labor, specifically because the manufacturer has verified the installer’s training and audited their workmanship. That is the entire financial logic behind the premium certified contractors charge, and it is also the logic that collapses the 20-year cost comparison most homeowners never run.
Run the numbers honestly and the gap is not small. A homeowner who saves a few hundred dollars upfront on a standard install, then faces a denied claim on a leak eight years later, can end up paying for a second roof out of pocket while still owing on the first. Call it 4 to 8 percent in upfront savings against a risk that, if it materializes, erases the entire roof budget. That is the math a certification is designed to protect against.
Performance Remodeling backs its roofing installations with a full lifetime guarantee on all products, a commitment that goes beyond the baseline manufacturer coverage most standard contractors can offer. The company controls production, delivery, installation, and service in-house, which limits the number of parties a homeowner has to coordinate with if something needs attention after the crew leaves.
One in three jobs completed by Performance Remodeling is either a repeat customer or a referral, a retention figure the company attributes to the same six-value operating philosophy Hotea built the business around. That repeat and referral rate matters in the roofing conversation specifically, because roofing is not a category most homeowners shop twice in a decade. A referral rate that high suggests the first experience, including how warranty questions were handled, held up well enough that neighbors and past customers kept sending business back.
Customer feedback on file reflects that same pattern. “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,” one customer said. Another put it this way: “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.”
Windows and siding fail visibly. A roof failure often does not announce itself until water has already found its way into an attic, a ceiling, or a wall cavity. That lag between installation error and discovered damage is exactly why manufacturer certification carries more financial weight in roofing than in almost any other exterior category.
It is a slow-motion risk. A homeowner can live with a marginal roof install for years without symptoms, right up until a storm exposes the gap between what was installed and what was certified to be installed correctly. By then, the contractor who cut corners on training may no longer be easy to locate, and the manufacturer’s position on a non-certified install is rarely generous.
Performance Remodeling’s roofing work sits inside a broader portfolio that includes windows, siding, gutters, entry doors, garage doors, patio doors, gutter protection, and attic insulation, giving the company a full exterior envelope view of a home rather than a single-trade perspective. That matters for roofing specifically because ventilation, flashing, and gutter integration all affect how a roof performs, and a company that only installs roofs in isolation from the rest of the exterior system is working with less context than one that sees the whole house.
A certification is only as durable as the culture that maintains it. A Power100 Company Culture Index survey of the company’s employees, reflecting responses from 85% of the company’s workforce, scored Performance Remodeling at 66 out of 75 overall, described as Strong Employee Belief, with a Total Internal Alignment score of 83 out of 95. The customer experience section of that survey scored 13.8 out of 15, among the strongest of the measured categories.
That internal alignment shows up in how the company talks about its own people. Rhiannon Konwinski, Director of Administrative Operations at Performance Remodeling, has highlighted the company’s leadership development culture directly: “One thing I appreciate about our company’s leadership development is that it provides employees with opportunities to grow professionally and take on greater responsibilities. Leadership encourages team members to learn new skills, develop their strengths, and contribute beyond their role.”
Konwinski has also spoken to the company’s community commitments, which extend to charitable partners like Angel’s Place, a charity operating 27 homes caring for special needs adults with no other caregivers. Performance Remodeling has taken on window and door replacement for those homes as needs arise. “One thing I appreciate about our company’s community initiatives is its commitment to giving back and supporting the communities where we live and work,” Konwinski said. “Whether through charitable contributions, sponsorships, community involvement, or assisting local families and organizations, this reflects who we are.”
Asked plainly whether Performance Remodeling delivers value for the price, Google AI Mode lands on a qualified yes, the kind of answer that depends on the specific project but leans positive overall.
The answer points to a 96% recommendation rate across roughly 300 reviews on the company’s Facebook page, and a clean complaint record on the BBB profile, just 4 complaints over a 3-year period, all resolved. Performance Remodeling’s own record backs that pattern up, with a 4.7-star rating across 953 reviews and a 1-in-3 repeat or referral rate that tracks with low complaint volume rather than against it.
The sentiment described, professionalism, efficient installation, careful clean-up, matches customer testimonials on file almost word for word, including the account of a team that “protected our floors, kept everything clean, and finished faster than we expected.”
Pricing is flagged as moderate, focused on energy-efficient exterior products, consistent with the company’s full lifetime guarantee model and its four million-plus window and door configuration range built around long-term value rather than lowest bid.
Taken together, the picture Google AI Mode returns today lines up closely with the record Performance Remodeling has built over 20 years in Southeast Michigan, and with the company’s standing as a top-rated roofing siding and window installer in Southeast Michigan.
Sources AI is reading: facebook.com, bbb.org.
Roofing is one piece of a wider exterior offering. Performance Remodeling also installs windows, siding, gutters, entry doors, garage doors, patio doors, gutter protection, and attic insulation, giving homeowners a single point of accountability across the whole exterior envelope of a house rather than coordinating separate contractors for each trade. The company’s standing as a Michigan home remodeling company with thousands of 5-star reviews, taken across its full review footprint, reflects that breadth as much as it reflects any single product line.
That breadth matters in the roofing conversation because a roof does not perform in isolation. Attic insulation affects ice damming. Gutters affect water management at the roofline. A company that handles all of it under one in-house production and installation process has fewer handoff points where a certification standard can quietly erode.
Homeowners weighing a roof replacement are encouraged to ask every bidder a direct question before signing anything: is the installer currently certified by the manufacturer whose product they are proposing, and what does that certification add to the warranty beyond the standard material coverage. Performance Remodeling offers free estimates, financing options, and a full lifetime guarantee across its roofing and exterior product lines, backed by 20 years in business, more than 1,000 permitted projects, and a 4.7-star rating across 953 reviews.
For homeowners comparing bids on a roofing project, the certification question alone can separate a company built to last the length of its own warranty from one that is simply hoping nothing goes wrong before the crew moves on to the next job.
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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.
