Flat roofing in Tarrant Monkton
Flat roof repairs, re-covering, leadwork and warm roof build ups in Tarrant Monkton and the DT11 villages. Free site visit, free written itemised quote.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
Flat roofs in Tarrant Monkton are small, short spanned and usually attached to something a good deal older than they are. The covering is rarely the difficult part. The lead, the upstand and the wall behind it are.
Three things usually bring the call. A length of lead has split and you can see daylight along the joint. A green streak has appeared down the wall under a corner of the roof. Or a cupboard against an outside wall has started to smell damp. This is a small village of older buildings with later additions tucked behind and beside them, so the roofs in question are an outshot over a kitchen, a lean-to, a porch, a bay top, or a store put up against an existing wall. Old buildings take a while to show a leak and then show it in the wrong place, so we work from the roof down rather than from the stain up, and photograph all of it before anyone puts a figure on the work.
The job itself
Awkward corners, old lead and short spans
Lead is usually where it starts. On these buildings the flashings were laid decades ago and fixed so tightly that they could not move, and lead that cannot move splits. After that comes the upstand that was dressed onto the face of the wall rather than cut into it, then the outlet, then the folds and the laps. A crack, a burst blister, an opened seam or a trim off its fixings is hours rather than days.
Re-covering a short span. Torch on felt, built up in three layers under a mineral cap sheet, takes an odd shape and several upstands better than anything else, which is why most of these roofs end up with it. A plain rectangle goes quicker in EPDM rubber, bonded down as one sheet. GRP fibreglass, laid wet and cured to a single skin with its trims, is for anything walked on. Single ply gets welded at the joints and suits roofs larger than the ones in this village. A day for a small roof, two to three working days for a garage or an extension.
The deck under it. Boarding turns up as often as plywood, OSB or chipboard. Firm decking is covered over, soft decking taken out, and the joist ends nearest the wall get the closest look, because that is where a slow leak has been sitting. Water lying about after rain means the fall was never cut or the outlet is buried, and firrings or tapered insulation put that back. Where a room sits below, rebuilding as a warm roof with rigid PIR above the deck and a vapour control layer under it keeps the timber above the dew point and designs interstitial condensation out. BS 6229:2025 on flat roofs sets that out and Approved Document L asks for it.
The rest of the detail. A cover flashing cut into a chase and wedged. An apron in lead, in lengths short enough to move. A generous upstand behind both of them. A cavity tray only where a cavity exists, which here is often not the case. Copings and parapets treated as part of the roof. A kerb built for a rooflight, a lantern, a Velux, a hatch, a soil pipe or a vent pipe. Then drip, edge trim, gutter, hopper and downpipe.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
Same team from first visit to last, one person to ring, and no sub-contracting your work out to somebody you have never met. The quote is itemised, not a figure on the back of a card: access, stripping the old covering, any new deck or firrings, the insulation, the membrane and each upstand, outlet and edge trim, and disposal on separate lines, so you can compare it properly against anyone else's.
Nothing is left open or unusable overnight. The site is swept at the end of each day rather than the end of the job, and what comes out leaves with us. If something turns up once we start that nobody could have seen, you get a photograph and a price before we carry on.
A re-cover in the same form is maintenance: no planning permission, and permitted development covers it, with Planning Portal guidance marking the edge of that. The village lies inside the Tarrant Valley conservation area, with a great many listed entries in and around it, so where a roof shows, or the building is listed, listed building consent is checked before a specification is written. Building control applies separately, under building notice or an application with full plans, when a new deck goes over a habitable room.
Cost
What decides the price of a flat roof
No rate per square metre, because the square metres are the easy part and what is under the covering is what decides the job.
Getting to it. A porch roof off a ladder, an outshot behind a cottage with no side way in, and a store on open ground are three different jobs. A garage or a single storey extension will often come off a tower, anything above a two storey wall wants a scaffold, and the platform has to stand while the deck is open rather than for an afternoon. The work at height rules are why it is a priced line rather than something folded into a rate.
The deck under the covering. A sound deck can be re-covered. Chipboard that has been wet for years, or ply that gives underfoot, has to come off and be replaced, and you cannot tell which you have from the ground or from a photograph. We lift a corner before quoting, because the deck is the single biggest swing in the price.
The falls, and where the water is meant to go. Most flat roofs that fail were never laid to a fall, or the fall runs at an outlet that has since been blocked or built over. Correcting it with firrings is more work than laying a membrane and it is the difference between a roof that lasts and one that ponds. Upstands, edge trims and each outlet are priced one at a time, because that is where the hours and the leaks both are.
Comparing quotes? Ask which system is being quoted and how many layers, whether the deck is being renewed or covered over, whether the falls are being corrected with firrings, how the upstands, outlets and edge trims are detailed, and whether the scaffold and the skip are in the price. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.
If it is coming through
Water through a flat roof
Ring rather than use the form. A flat roof that has split, blistered or lifted at an upstand puts water straight onto a ceiling, and once the deck is wet the damage carries on after the rain stops. The first visit is about getting it covered and dry, and we price the permanent job once we can see how much of the deck has gone. The Tarrant valley is a run up the A354 for us, but anything actively coming through is made watertight before we talk about the permanent job. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
In the conservation area, photograph it before it comes off
The whole village sits inside the conservation area, so even a small garage roof that shows from the lane is within its scope. A like for like re-cover is still maintenance and there is nothing to apply for. The practical difficulty is proving that it was like for like once the old roof is in a skip, and that is easily solved: take photographs of the existing roof, its finish and its trims before anybody starts, and keep them with the written quote. We do that as a matter of course and you get copies.
Where it stops being simple is on a listed building, and there are a lot of them here. Chasing a new flashing into an old wall, changing the material of a covering that can be seen, or altering the shape of the roof are alterations, and consent comes first rather than after. It is not usually difficult and it is rarely refused for sensible work, but it does put weeks on the front of the job. Tell us the address when you ring and we will say straight away which of those you are in, so you can start the right thing first.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Tarrant Monkton, Tarrant Rushton, Tarrant Keyneston, Blandford Forum and the DT11 villages along the Tarrant. You are dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building, the trading name of Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, which you can look up in a minute. Thomas Hannen's business, and he is the one who comes out to price the job, not a salesman. A verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written quote are both free.
Questions
Tarrant Monkton questions we get asked
Can you reuse the old lead?
Sometimes, if it is sound and the right code for where it sits. More often the lead has split because it was fixed rigidly and could not move with the temperature, and re-laying it in shorter lengths with proper fixings is what stops that happening again. We will tell you which after we have seen it.
My cottage is listed. What can be done without consent?
Straightforward maintenance in the same materials generally goes ahead. A change of material, a change of appearance, or cutting into the fabric for a new flashing is alteration and wants consent. Ask before you order anything, because the paperwork is the slow part, not the roofing.
Is a small roof cheaper per square metre?
It is not really a square metre job at all. On a small roof almost all of the work is at the edges, the upstands and the outlet, so two roofs of the same size can be very different jobs. That is why the quote is itemised rather than a rate.
What happens if you find rot once it is open?
You get a photograph and a price before we carry on, not an extra line on the invoice at the end. Nothing is left open overnight, so if a decision takes a day the roof is covered and watertight while you make it.
Nearby, and next door
Flat roofing near Tarrant Monkton
Flat roofing nearby
Our other trades in Tarrant Monkton
Everything we do in Blandford Forum Flat roofing, all areas Every area we cover
Free quote
Get a price for your Tarrant Monkton flat roof
Tell us the address and what you have noticed. We will come out, look hard at the lead and the junctions, and put an itemised price in writing. No charge, and no obligation.