Marysville, settled in 1755, fills a narrow strip between Cove Mountain and Blue Mountain beside the Susquehanna, and we come out to repair or replace roofs on its houses from the river edge up the slope.
Marysville has about 2.3 square miles of land and roughly 2,681 people. It sits about 6 miles northwest of downtown Harrisburg-Carlisle. We cover ZIP code 17053.
No completed roof in Marysville is logged in our job records yet.
Much of Marysville's housing is old: 38% of the borough's homes were built in 1939 or earlier, against 22% built in 2000 or later, so a roof here may sit on old board decking or on modern sheathing. A house from before 1940 may still wear slate, or carry newer shingles over planks laid when it was built. Of the 1225 homes, 750 stand detached and 214 are single-family homes joined to the house next door, where two roofs meet at the shared wall and the flashing along that line keeps water out. Another 73 are mobile homes, which take a different kind of roof.
Ground in the borough runs from about 328 feet at the river to 1,200 feet on Cove Mountain, so a house by the water and a house up the slope face different conditions. At the National Weather Service's Harrisburg station, at Harrisburg International Airport in Middletown, the 1991-2020 normal is 101.1 days a year with a low at or below 32°F and 18.7 days a year with a high at or below 32°F. Snow piles on roofs here and ice dams build at the eaves, while humid summers leave mildew, moss and algae on slopes that stay damp.
Marysville publishes a Building UCC Permit Application and a Residential Plan Submittal Guide on its Forms & Permits page. Most permits are issued within three days of submitting the required application form, and the Code Enforcement Officer issues sewer and zoning permits. If your job calls for that application, we fill it in and submit it to the borough. Heat shows up on the roof too: 503 of the borough's 1164 occupied homes heat with fuel oil, and an oil burner usually vents through a chimney, so the metal that seals the chimney to the shingles is a good place to start when a ceiling stain appears.
The postwar housing in Marysville 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.
The Census Bureau counts 1,225 homes in Marysville, with a median year built of 1955. 470 of them (38%) went up before 1940 — 17th of 37 places on this site for pre-1940 share — and 273 (22%) in 2000 or later. More of today's homes date from before 1940 than from any decade since. Across Perry County the pre-1940 share is 21%, so Marysville sits above it.
A roof's first layer has a service life of about 20 years, according to HUD's Residential Rehabilitation Inspection Guide. By that measure, 78% of Marysville's homes — the 952 built before 2000 — are past their first roof, and the 718 built before 1970 (59%) are usually on a third covering or later. First replacements are arriving on the 147 homes built in the 2000s, while the 126 built since 2010 are mostly still on the roof they were built with. Older houses are where a second layer laid over the first turns up, and that layer is what hides soft decking.
61% of homes in Marysville are single-family detached houses (750) and 17% attached ones such as townhouses (214). 94 homes (8%) sit in two- to nine-unit buildings and 94 (8%) in buildings of ten units or more, whose roofs are normally an owner's or a board's call rather than a resident's. The count also takes in 73 mobile homes, which are a different kind of roof job. Owners live in 83% of the 1,164 occupied homes. When we look at houses like these, our 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 | 470 | 38% | |
| 1940s | 80 | 7% | |
| 1950s | 129 | 11% | |
| 1960s | 39 | 3% | |
| 1970s | 76 | 6% | |
| 1980s | 80 | 7% | |
| 1990s | 78 | 6% | |
| 2000s | 147 | 12% | |
| 2010s | 92 | 8% | |
| 2020 or later | 34 | 3% |
Census ACS 2020–2024, tables B25034, B25035, B25024 and B25003: 1,225 homes, 1,164 occupied. Survey estimates.
From 2016 through 2025, NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center recorded one report of hail of 1 inch or more within 5 miles of Marysville’s center. The stone was 1.25 inches, on July 17, 2021, about 3.8 miles west of the center. Counts follow people as much as storms, since every report is a spotter’s or a resident’s.
Hail damage rarely shows from the ground; a storm inspection photographs each slope so you know either way.
Nothing Marysville publishes says whether a like-for-like re-roof needs a permit. We call the department before the job and pull whatever is required.
Marysville does not publish the code edition it currently enforces. We confirm the edition with the building department before we write the scope.
Marysville does not publish a building official’s name, so the permit conversation is with the department itself. We check the department’s own page for its current permit rules before a job.
Design wind here is set by location, not one figure for the whole area: 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. The building department for Marysville can tell you which figure applies. What it does to a roof is in the roofing code guide.
| City | Re-roof permit | Code | Median built |
|---|---|---|---|
| Marysville | Not published | Not published | 1955 |
| Bloomfield | Not published | Not published | 1943 |
| Duncannon | Not published | Not published | 1939 or earlier |
| Newport | Not published | Not published | 1939 or earlier |
| Unincorporated Perry County | Not published | UCC (2021 IRC) | — |
Every Perry County city we cover, side by side →
Many Marysville homes went up before 1940, and attics that old were seldom built with the insulation and airflow of a newer house. Heat from the rooms below warms the roof deck, snow on the upper slope melts, and the water freezes again at the cold overhang. That ridge of ice holds back more meltwater, which can creep under the shingles and show up as a stain on a ceiling or an upstairs wall.
Not often. From 2016 through 2025, one report of hail an inch or larger was logged within 5 miles of the borough: 1.25-inch stones on July 17, 2021, 3.8 miles to the west. Most recent hail reports across the Harrisburg-Carlisle metro came in June. After a summer storm, dented gutters, bruised shingles or granules washed into the downspouts are the signs a roof took hits.
Marysville does not publish a clear answer either way. We confirm it with the building department before starting and pull whatever is required.
By the Census Bureau's estimates, 78% of Marysville's homes were built before 2000 and 59% before 1970, with a median year built of 1955 (2020–2024 estimates). A roof usually lasts about 20 years, so the deck and the layers get checked before any quote.
One report of 1-inch-plus hail fell within 5 miles of Marysville between 2016 and 2025: 1.25 inches on July 17, 2021 (NOAA Storm Prediction Center).
Not yet: no completed roof in Marysville 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: marysvilleboroughpa.gov · marysvilleboroughpa.gov · data.census.gov · data.census.gov · data.census.gov · www2.census.gov · www2.census.gov · data.census.gov · data.census.gov · en.wikipedia.org · www.spc.noaa.gov. Rules and staff change; check with the jurisdiction.