Trueline Roofers takes on roof repairs and replacements in Enhaut, a 0.2-square-mile community in Swatara Township four miles southeast of downtown Harrisburg, where 207 of 474 homes went up in 1939 or earlier.
Enhaut has about 0.2 square miles of land and roughly 1,197 people. It sits about 4 miles southeast of downtown Harrisburg-Carlisle. We cover ZIP code 17113.
No completed roof in Enhaut is logged in our job records yet.
Enhaut is a small place: 0.2 square miles, 474 homes and 1197 residents, bordering Steelton and Bressler. It is an unincorporated community in Swatara Township, at an elevation of about 490 feet. It sat inside a combined Bressler-Enhaut-Oberlin census area until the 2010 census split the three apart.
The housing is older than Dauphin County as a whole, where the median home was built in 1972. Here the median is 1950, and 207 of the 474 homes, or 44%, date to 1939 or earlier. Another 29 went up in the 1940s and 52 in the 1950s. Roofs on those houses sit over older decking and framing, and earlier re-roofs may have left a second layer of shingles under the top one. After the pre-1940 houses, the biggest group is the 87 homes from the 1970s, and 73 more were built from 2000 to 2009. Of the 474 homes, 396 are detached houses and 453 are owner-occupied, so a roof here is almost always one household's decision.
Winters in Enhaut are cold enough that snow piles up on roofs, and ice dams are the usual result where a house leaks heat into the attic: snow melts from underneath and the water refreezes at the eave. Utility gas heats 212 homes and fuel oil heats 196, while 66 heat with electricity. Summers are humid, and moss and algae settle on shaded slopes.
The postwar housing in Enhaut is mostly simple to roof, which is why it gets done badly so often. Decking is usually 1x6 boards or early plywood, still sound but worth walking rather than assuming. The recurring problems are the low-slope sections — porch roofs, carport tie-ins, the flat bit over an addition — where a shingle was installed below its rated pitch and has been failing quietly ever since. Attic ventilation on houses of this era is also routinely short of what current shingle warranties require, and under-venting cooks a roof from underneath. We measure intake against exhaust before we quote rather than just nailing on a ridge vent and calling it solved.
By the Census Bureau's estimate there are 474 homes in Enhaut, with a median year built of 1950. 207 of them (44%) went up before 1940 — 11th of 37 places on this site for pre-1940 share — and 73 (15%) in 2000 or later. More of today's homes date from before 1940 than from any decade since. (Dauphin County as a whole: 19% before 1940.)
The Residential Rehabilitation Inspection Guide from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development puts the service life of a roof's first layer at about 20 years. By that measure, 85% of Enhaut's homes — the 401 built before 2000 — are past their first roof, and 66% (314 homes) go back before 1970, two roof lives and more. First replacements are arriving on the 73 homes built in the 2000s. Older houses are where a second layer laid over the first turns up, and that layer is what hides soft decking.
By building type: 396 detached houses (84%), 72 attached (15%). 6 homes (1%) sit in two- to nine-unit buildings. Owners live in 96% of the 474 occupied homes. On a housing mix like this, the work can include full tear-offs on houses past two roof lives, deck and flashing checks on pre-war board sheathing and flat and low-slope sections, which turn up more on attached and multi-unit buildings.
| Built | Homes | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Before 1940 | 207 | 44% | |
| 1940s | 29 | 6% | |
| 1950s | 52 | 11% | |
| 1960s | 26 | 5% | |
| 1970s | 87 | 18% | |
| 1980s | 0 | 0% | |
| 1990s | 0 | 0% | |
| 2000s | 73 | 15% | |
| 2010s | 0 | 0% | |
| 2020 or later | 0 | 0% |
Census ACS 2020–2024, tables B25034, B25035, B25024 and B25003: 474 homes, 474 occupied. Survey estimates.
From 2016 through 2025, NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center recorded 5 reports of hail of 1 inch or more within 5 miles of Enhaut’s center, spread over 3 storm days. 1 of them was 1.75 inches or larger. The largest, 1.75 inches, came on June 3, 2023, about 3.5 miles northwest of the center. A report needs someone to see the hail and send it in, so the count is a floor, not a full tally.
| Latest reports | Size | From center |
|---|---|---|
| June 3, 2023 | 1 inch | 3.2 mi NW |
| June 3, 2023 | 1.75 inches | 3.5 mi NW |
| June 3, 2023 | 1.25 inches | 4 mi NW |
| June 16, 2022 | 1 inch | 3.7 mi S |
| June 10, 2020 | 1 inch | 4.8 mi E |
Hail damage rarely shows from the ground; a storm inspection photographs each slope so you know either way.
Permits and inspections for Enhaut run through the municipality that enforces Pennsylvania's Uniform Construction Code there, or through a third-party agency or the Department of Labor and Industry where it does not. Before a re-roof we ask the office that covers the address whether a permit is needed, and where one is, we pull it.
The code that applies in Enhaut is Pennsylvania's Uniform Construction Code, which adopts the 2021 International Residential Code for the whole state (34 Pa. Code 403.21). We build to it and to the manufacturer's instructions.
What goes into a new roof, layer by layerWind design is looked up by address across the Harrisburg-Carlisle, Pennsylvania metro: we build to the design wind speed set for the address; Township of Upper Allen’s published table gives 90 mph, and the building department can say which figure applies to a given address. See the roofing code guide for what it governs.
Enhaut borders Steelton and Bressler. Our pages for them:
Also in Dauphin County:
| City | Re-roof permit | Code | Median built |
|---|---|---|---|
| Enhaut | Not published | UCC (2021 IRC) | 1950 |
| Steelton | Not published | Not published | 1949 |
| Colonial Park | Not published | UCC (2021 IRC) | 1969 |
| Unincorporated Dauphin County | Not published | UCC (2021 IRC) | — |
| Elizabethville | Not published | Not published | 1951 |
| Harrisburg | Yes | Not published | 1947 |
| Hershey | Not published | UCC (2021 IRC) | 1970 |
Every Dauphin County city we cover, side by side →
Enhaut winters bring snow that piles up on roofs. Heat leaking into the attic melts snow on the roof from underneath, and the water refreezes at the cold eave. Attic insulation and clear vents are the usual cure.
It can. With 207 of Enhaut's 474 homes dating to 1939 or earlier, the decking and rafters under the shingles are often the bigger question. Once the old layers are off, any boards that must be replaced are best priced as their own item.
Permits and inspections for Enhaut run through the municipality that enforces Pennsylvania's Uniform Construction Code there, or through a third-party agency or the Department of Labor and Industry where it does not. Before a re-roof we ask the office that covers the address whether a permit is needed, and where one is, we pull it.
By the Census Bureau's estimates, 85% of Enhaut's homes were built before 2000 and 66% before 1970, with a median year built of 1950 (2020–2024 estimates). A roof usually lasts about 20 years, so the deck and the layers get checked before any quote.
The last report near Enhaut of hail 1 inch or bigger came on June 3, 2023; NOAA's records hold 5 of them within 5 miles since 2016.
Not yet: no completed roof in Enhaut is in our job records, so this page shows no job count.
Researched 2026-11-09; housing, Census ACS 2020–2024; hail, NOAA SPC. Sources: data.census.gov · data.census.gov · data.census.gov · www2.census.gov · www2.census.gov · data.census.gov · data.census.gov · en.wikipedia.org · www2.census.gov · www.spc.noaa.gov. Rules and staff change; check with the jurisdiction.