2026 tax year
Roofer taxes and deductions
Workers' compensation is the largest insurance cost in roofing by a wide margin, the rates are the highest of any building trade because the injury rates are. It is fully deductible, and it is not optional once anyone works for you.
Fall-protection equipment is both a legal requirement and an ordinary business expense, so there is no tension between the two. Storm work is the tax problem peculiar to roofing: a hail season can double a year’s income and push you into brackets a normal year never reaches, and insurance proceeds paid directly to a homeowner are their money rather than yours. Tear-off dumpsters and crane hire are deductible in full in the year of hire.
The deductions with a rule attached
These are the lines where the answer is not simply "keep the receipt"each has a cap, a percentage or a test that decides how much of the spend you actually get:
- Vehicle
- Business driving counts; commuting does not. The rate changed mid-year: 72.5 cents a mile to June 30, 2026 and 76 cents from July 1, so a full year has to be split at that date rather than multiplied by one figure. A hundred business miles a week across the whole year is about $3,861 off your profit. You cannot use the standard rate at all on a vehicle you have already claimed MACRS depreciation, Section 179 or bonus depreciation on.
The rest of the roofer deduction list
Ordinary and necessary business expenses, deductible in full in the year you pay them, provided they are genuinely for the business:
- Materials and supplies
- Equipment you hire rather than buy
- Liability insurance
- Workers’ compensation insurance
- Safety equipment
- Subcontractors you pay
- Waste and disposal charges
Worth knowing
Workers' compensation is the dominant insurance cost in roofing and is fully deductible. Fall-protection equipment is both a legal requirement and an ordinary business expense.
That is what is specific to this trade. The larger deductions are the universal ones, see the full checklist.
What each deduction is worth to you
On $100,000 of profit with no state income tax, $1,000 deducted saves $305, 30.5%, because it comes off self-employment tax and income tax together:
| Net profit | Saved per $1,000 deducted | Effective |
|---|---|---|
| $40,000 | $231 | 23.1% |
| $100,000 | $305 | 30.5% |
| $200,000 | $297 | 29.7% |
The last row is worth less than the one above it, and that is not a mistake: past the Social Security wage base the self-employment part of the saving drops from 15.3% to 2.9%, and the higher income-tax bracket does not quite make up the difference. A deduction is worth most in the middle.
Add a state income tax and every row rises. The 1099 calculator applies that layer.
What these words mean
- Section 179
- A rule letting you deduct the whole cost of equipment in the year you start using it, instead of spreading it over the years you own it.
- Depreciation
- Spreading the cost of something long-lasting, a vehicle, a camera, a tractor, across the years you use it, rather than deducting it all at once.
- MACRS
- The standard federal timetable for depreciation, the schedule that decides how much of an asset’s cost you deduct in each year of its life.
Related
- Full deductions checklist
- Every profession
- 1099 taxes by state
- Quarterly payments
- Is an S-corp worth it?
- Local income tax
General information about how these deductions work, not tax advice. Whether a particular expense is deductible for you depends on facts this page does not have, check with a tax professional before claiming anything listed here.