Conveniently, local roofing material and hardware outlets use online delivery systems and their own transportation vehicles to deliver their products that buyers purchased through their websites. However, some homeowners in Corpus Christi TX are slowly finding seemingly great deals on asphalt shingles, metal roofing, and other roofing materials through general online marketplaces.

Digital marketplaces have a wide variety of products you can purchase. Most of them look great in the photos. However, it pays to read the reviews included with each product. It’s easy to create an excellent photograph of products — especially when it comes to supposedly durable roofing materials.

The most challenging part of identifying excellent roofing materials from lackluster ones is their lifespan. High-quality asphalt shingles from renowned manufacturers will last for 20-30 years. On the other hand, you can purchase a bundle of asphalt shingles from an unknown source online, and you’ll be surprised it looks just as high as your old asphalt shingle roof. That is until it starts to show extreme wear and tear by the end of three months.

In this light, when using alternative digital shops to purchase seemingly durable roofing materials, we advise you to use only brands you can trust. Check with the seller about the product manufacturer’s background and their processes. Most notably, read reviews about the products. Many disgruntled or satisfied customers will rant or rave about the products they’ve purchased.

Furthermore, to avoid the dangers of inferior roofing materials for cheap, take a look at Fox 43‘s online shopping tips below. Lastly, if you need an excellent roofer for all your repair and replacement needs, you can count on us at Miller’s Home Improvement. Contact us today!

Vinny Sakore says he is always skeptical when buying things online.

He’s a visiting cybersecurity professor at Messiah College and knows not all reviews are truthful.

Just google “how to buy reviews” and you’ll find a bunch of websites offering the service.

Sakore said, “Typically it’s between $2-4 is when you get charged.”

We found an ad on the freelancing website “Fiverr.”

This person is offering “positive 5-star Yelp, Google, Facebook, TripAdvisor & Special Requests reviews”

“A lot of fake reviews do come from overseas so there is certainly terminology that is a red flag,” said the cybersecurity expert.

One big red flag is poor grammar.

Now let’s go back to the ad I just showed you.

The seller is offering a “full guaranteed” the review will stick.

Instead of what we would say, which is a “full guarantee.”

Here’s another red flag: “Words like bad. We typically don’t use the term bad. It’s something someone from maybe overseas would use. If you see a huge number of reviews on the same day, that’s a flag too. I’ll just avoid those,” said Sakore.

Often you can find a search box to type in specific terms while reading reviews.

Search some cliche phrases and you’ll find a lot of similar reviews.

“If you think about it, if someone is buying reviews, the people who are selling them are not rewriting new ones every single time. They’re using old code.”

That’s how some websites can detect fake reviews.

“They look for those terms, then they scan through them all and give it a rating.”

One of the sites that review the reviews is Fakespot.com.

“I actually started the website when I got duped by buying products with fake reviews on Amazon,” said Saoud Khalifah, the CEO of Fakespot.com.

He says electronics and accessories aren’t always what they seem.

“So we’re talking about small products, phone case overs, blue tooth headphones, robotic vacuum cleaners in certain cases,” said Khalifah.

He says these products tend to have a high amount of competition, so the 5-star reviews make them stand out when people search. (Continued)