Garage Doors on Houses Built Before Insulation Rules

What to Check

Start with the door skin. If it's a single layer of steel with no backer panel, or a wood door with no foam board glued behind it, you're looking at construction from before insulation requirements were part of the code. Run your hand along the inside face on a cold day - if it's as cold as the outside air, there's nothing stopping heat transfer.

Check the bottom seal next. Older doors in Novi's housing stock, most of it dating 1938 to 1991 with a median build year of 1965, often have the original vinyl astragal, which has usually hardened and cracked by now. A hard seal lets cold air and meltwater straight under the door.

Look at the panel seams too. Doors from this era were often shipped without the tighter tolerances used today, so gaps between sections widen as the steel ages and the hinges wear. None of this means the door is broken - it means it was built to a different standard, for a house built to a different standard.