Permanent or seasonal, over five years.

Which costs less over five years, permanent or seasonal lighting?

Seasonal lighting is a smaller cost repeated every year; permanent lighting is a larger cost paid once, plus service. Over five years the two can land close together, and which one wins depends on your roofline length, the product chosen and how long you plan to stay. Only one of the two has a published starting price.

That last point matters, so it goes near the top rather than in a footnote.

What we can tell you, and what we will not guess at

Holiday lighting packages start at $750. That figure is published, it is real, and it is a starting point — what moves it is how much roofline you want lit and how high it is.

We do not publish a starting price for permanent roofline lighting. Permanent hardware, installation and service arrangements are quoted on their own proposal, and the seasonal starting price and the holiday promotion do not apply to them.

TODO(owner): this guide is built to carry a real five-year table, and it will be the most useful page in the lighting cluster once it does. To finish it we need two figures from you: (a) a typical permanent roofline installed price, or a range, for a representative Houston home, and (b) the typical seasonal renewal price for year two onward. Until those exist, this page compares the structure of the two costs and refuses to invent the numbers — a fabricated cost table is the fastest way to lose a customer at the quote.

How the seasonal cost actually behaves

A seasonal package is not only the install. Every package, at every scope, includes the design consult and on-site measure, commercial-grade C9 bulbs and wire, lights custom-cut to your rooflines, professional installation on safe roof clips, service visits through the season, and January takedown.

Year one

You pay the package price. If you lease the lights, we store them; if you buy them, the product cost sits inside year one and you store them yourself.

Years two to five

You pay again each season, and the price depends on your agreement, your scope and any design changes. We confirm renewal pricing before you renew. What does not change is that the labour — install, service, takedown — recurs annually, because the lights come down every January.

The cost people forget

Scope creep. Most households add rather than subtract: ridges and hips one year, window outlines the next. Each is quoted separately, and each raises the annual figure permanently.

How the permanent cost actually behaves

Permanent roofline lighting inverts the shape. The hardware and installation are a single up-front cost, and after that the recurring cost is service rather than re-installation — nothing is taken down in January, so there is no annual takedown and no annual re-install.

What you are buying

Fixed track mounted to the soffit, with the fixtures in it year-round. It is a building product, not a seasonal service, and it is used well beyond Christmas — most people who install it end up running it on low warm white most evenings.

What carries the warranty

Permanent soffit track carries our separate 2-year workmanship warranty on non-roofing trades. Hardware coverage is confirmed for the specific product selected. That is a different thing from the seasonal product warranty below, and the two are worth not confusing.

The warranty difference, stated plainly

This is the part most comparisons get wrong.

• Leased seasonal lights carry a lifetime warranty for as long as they are on your house. A bulb or a strand fails, we replace it.
• Seasonal lights you own outright carry a 5-year warranty. Shorter, for one honest reason: they spend eleven months a year in your garage rather than in our care.
• Both of those cover the lights and the bulbs — the product. Neither is a workmanship warranty on the installation.
• Permanent soffit track carries the 2-year workmanship term on non-roofing trades.

Anyone quoting you an unqualified “lifetime warranty” on permanent lighting is describing something different from what we offer, and it is worth asking them which part of it is covered.

So which should you choose?

Choose seasonal if you like changing the look year to year, if you are not certain you are staying in the house, or if you want the lowest entry cost this December.

Choose permanent if you intend to stay, if you want the lights used year-round rather than for six weeks, and if you would rather pay once than book an installer every October.

Get a real number for your house

Neither of these is a number anyone should quote you over the phone. We measure the roofline, check the access and the power, and put one lump-sum figure in writing.

See what is included and what drives the price, build a plan for your own house, or read up on permanent roofline lighting and the lighting hub.