515-585-9079 Get a Quote Get a Quote
Windsor Heights, Iowa

Christmas Light Installation in Windsor Heights, Iowa

In most towns, lights on the roof are decoration. In Windsor Heights they are an entry, because the whole city gets driven and scored on one night in December. That changes the deadline, and it changes what a good install has to look like.

The Thing No Other Suburb Has

In Windsor Heights, Your Lights Get Judged

The Windsor Heights Foundation runs a judged holiday lighting contest for the whole city. Homes sign up, judges drive the streets on one night, and the winners are read out the next day.

120

homes take part in the citywide lighting contest in a typical year. That is not one street. That is entries spread across the whole town.

City of Windsor Heights, holiday lighting contest
2,320

housing units in the entire city, on the city's own count. The census puts it a little higher at 2,411. Either way, Windsor Heights is small and landlocked.

City of Windsor Heights, and U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2020 to 2024
1 in 20

homes in town, near enough, put their name in. That holds whichever housing unit count you use.

City of Windsor Heights, contest entries set against the city's housing unit count

How the Windsor Heights contest works

Homes enter. On one evening in early December the judges start driving, and they cover the streets in one pass. Winners get read out the next day at Windsor Wonderland, the free party the Foundation throws at Colby Park, with a countdown to light the park itself. The judged area is written down and it is most of the town: south of Hickman Road, Franklin Avenue, Marylynn Drive and 72nd Street. If you live inside that box, a car full of judges goes past your house whether you signed up or not.

The contest is judged in several named categories rather than one prize. Over the years those have included things like most creative, best music and animation, best theme and best overall, which tells you the town rewards more than one kind of display. The Foundation sets the list each year, so get the current one from them before you plan a house around a category.

!

What we will not do is print you a date

The Foundation sets the entry deadline, the judging night and the category list each year, and the city's own contest page moves around. So we are not going to put this year's dates on a lighting company's website and let you plan around them. Call the city or the Foundation and get the current year from the people who run it.

What does not move is the shape of it. Entries first. One judging night in early December. Winners at Windsor Wonderland the next day. Plan on that and you will not be caught out.

Judging night is the real deadline in Windsor Heights, not Christmas Eve.

Get my free satellite estimate
Windsor Heights Homes

A City That Stopped Growing In 1958

Windsor Heights is landlocked, and the city limits have not moved since 1958. There is nowhere left to add a subdivision, so the housing here is old, and it is remarkably alike from street to street.

Windsor Heights housing The number Why it matters on a roofline
Median year built 1960 The oldest of any city we cover. Waukee's median is 2011 and Ankeny's is 2006.
Biggest single decade The 1950s, 774 homes One building era, one common shape of house, one common shape of roof.
Second biggest decade The 1960s, 702 homes Those two decades together are 61 percent of every home in town.
Built before 1960 About half Half the town predates 1960, so Tate checks the gutter and fascia on your house before anything clips to it.
Built in 2020 or later None recorded Exactly what a city with fixed 1958 borders should look like.
Detached single-family 82.3 percent The highest share in the metro. Almost every address here is a house with its own roof.
Owner-occupied 78.7 percent Most people here can say yes to lights without asking anybody.
U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 2020 to 2024, tables B25034, B25024 and B25003 ↗

Why the houses look the way they do

Charles H. Colby and his son bought 160 acres here in 1915 and built the low California style ranch homes the town is still known for. The place was called Colby Acres before it was called anything else. Residents voted it into a city on July 19, 1941, by 300 to 222, mostly to keep Des Moines from swallowing it. Then the 1950s happened, and that is the decade that built most of what you see today.

This is the only city on our whole site where we will say "1950s ranch homes" out loud. Everywhere else in the metro that phrase is a real estate slogan with nothing behind it. Here the census backs it up: median year 1960, the 1950s the largest decade at 774 homes with the 1960s next at 702, and four out of five addresses a detached house. If somebody tells you Urbandale or West Des Moines is a postwar ranch town, they have not looked. Windsor Heights actually is one.

One more thing that number does: it tells you your neighbors' houses are shaped like yours. In a town where the judges drive every street, that matters. You are not being compared against a five-peak new build across town. You are being compared against the ranch next door.

Send the address and Tate reads your Windsor Heights roofline off satellite imagery.

Get my free satellite estimate
The Job Itself

What A 1950s Ranch Means On Install Day

Low, long and single pitch. That shape makes the work easier and the result harder, and both halves are true.

The easy part

A ranch front is one long run of gutter with one main pitch above it. There is no third story, no dormer stack, and often no reason to get far off the ground. Compared to a cut-up two story house out west, a Windsor Heights ranch is a short day.

The hard part

That long straight line is exactly what shows a mistake. On a busy roof, a gap hides behind a gable. On a flat ranch run, one bulb sitting low is visible from the street, and so is a doubled-up section where a retail strand ran out.

The strand length trap

Store strands come in fixed lengths. Your ranch front is whatever length it happens to be. We measure the run and cut it to that, so the spacing stays even from the corner of the garage to the far end of the eave.

The outlet question

We run off the exterior outlets your house already has. If there is nothing usable near the end of a run, Tate tells you before install day so you can decide what to do about it.

How the lights go on the house

We use pro-grade clips made for gutters, shingles and fascia. They attach without nails or screws wherever the roofline allows it. Where a spot does not allow it, Tate agrees the method with you before he does anything. On a house from the 1950s that conversation happens more often than it does on a new build, and we would rather have it on the ground than surprise you later.

One price covers the install, the season, January takedown and storage.

Get my free satellite estimate
Being Straight With You

When Windsor Heights Should Not Hire Us

?

Four honest notes about lighting a house here

Half this town could do it themselves. If you own a low ranch, your gutter line is reachable, and you actually enjoy the job, go do it. On this housing stock that is a fair option, and more of it is fair here than anywhere else we work. Hire us when you want the straight line, the whole roof instead of just the garage, and somebody else doing it in January.

We cannot win you the contest. We measure, cut and hang. The judges score. Anyone promising you a category is selling you something. What we can do is make sure nothing is dark or crooked the night the car comes past.

About one home in five here is rented. Ownership sits near 78.7 percent, so a real slice of the city rents. If you rent, get your landlord's yes first. We do not put anything on a house without the owner saying so.

Small town, short route. Windsor Heights is small, so once we are on your street we are already on your neighbor's. If two or three houses near you book together, tell Tate. It makes the route easier and he would rather you asked.

Warm white C9 bulbs running an even line along a low single story gutter and front peak at dusk

Straight lines are the whole job

Even spacing. One clean run from corner to corner. Nothing sagging, nothing doubled, no cord looping down the wall where the judges can see it.

On a long ranch roofline that is not a detail. It is the difference between a house that reads finished from the street and one that reads like a Saturday that ran out of daylight.

See exactly what we install →

Keep Reading

The Questions Windsor Heights Asks First

Go deeper: what drives the price • when to book • doing it yourself • storage in January • a bulb out in December • everything we install

Next door: Clive • Urbandale • West Des Moines

Get A Free Windsor Heights Roofline Estimate

Send us the address. Tate pulls satellite imagery of your roofline, measures the runs and counts the peaks off the image, and texts a real ballpark back. Usually the same day. No appointment, and nobody walks your property for this part.

Get your Windsor Heights estimate

Two fields. Tate reads your roofline off satellite imagery and texts a ballpark back, usually the same day.

Required: texting is how Tate sends your estimate and confirms your install date.

The estimate is free and there is no obligation. Installs start mid-October and the calendar fills before Thanksgiving, so earlier is better.

Rather talk first? Call or text 515-585-9079, or use the contact page.

Get a Free Estimate Call