Roofing in Bearwood

A torch through the hatch shows you the torn felt. Under the tiles on a house of this vintage sits bitumen felt, and by now it has sagged into troughs between the rafters and torn where it laps into the gutter.

That tear is the usual cause of a wet fascia and a stained ceiling in Bearwood, and you can often see it from the loft hatch with a torch. Soft batten ends and a damp rafter foot tell the same story.

Slipped, cracked and missing tiles. By a distance the likeliest fault on roofs of this age. On a concrete interlocking tile roof of this age the tile is rarely the problem: the nails holding the perimeter courses have rusted thin, or a clip has let go, and the covering starts to creep. We fit a matched tile, re-fix the ones either side and chase the reason, not the symptom. Storm damage after a south westerly tends to turn up along the same two or three courses.

Everything built in Bearwood before the late 1980s has ridge and hip tiles bedded in mortar and a gable verge pointed in the same stuff. The bedding cracks, frost gets in, and a ridge that rocks under your hand will go in a gale. We convert to a dry ridge and dry verge system screwed onto a ventilated roll, the mechanical fixing BS 5534 expects, which vents the roof space along the ridge at the same time. Dry fixed edges are priced by the metre.

When nails, battens and felt have gone together, patching stops being worth the money. The covering comes off, soft timber is cut out, and it goes back on breathable membrane and treated battens with a matched concrete tile. If it is one slipped tile, a loose ridge cap or a drip you want traced, that is on our page for roof repairs in Bearwood. Nearly every house on these estates has a flat roof over the garage or extension, in felt, GRP fibreglass or EPDM rubber, and we look at the deck first, because a new membrane over a soft deck is money thrown away.

Chimney flashings, soakers, the valley between two roof planes and the abutment where a rear extension meets the house wall go in code rated lead cut so it can move. The uPVC rainwater goods fitted across these streets in the 1990s are often on their second set of brackets, and clearing the moss and debris out of them heads off the rotted fascia below. With the covering off, insulation and eaves ventilation are far cheaper to sort, and Approved Document L sets the standard a renovated roof is expected to reach.

We never quote a roof by the square metre. Houses built here in the post-war decades and the eighties mostly have simple roof shapes, so the price turns on access and on what is under the tiles.

Scaffold. A detached house with a drive to stand the scaffold on is straightforward. A mid terrace may need it across both neighbours' frontages, and on a link detached house the garage roof between the two has to be bridged. The work at height rules make the platform a priced line, and how long it stands counts as much as its size.

Under the tiles. Bitumen felt of that era often goes brittle and tears at the eaves, leaving the bottom battens wet. Whether every batten and the whole membrane are renewed, or only the worst, is the biggest choice on the quote.

The covering. Concrete interlocking tiles back on new battens is the usual route. Changing to a heavier tile or to slate alters the load on the trusses, which then need checking.

The details. Dry ridge and verge systems, lead flashings where the roof meets a wall, and valleys on L-shaped houses are priced one by one.

Flats. On a block the freeholder or managing agent instructs the work, and a large job may need section 20 consultation with the leaseholders first.

Faced with another roofer's price, ask if scaffolding is in it, whether new battens and membrane go on throughout or only in patches, and who is paying for the skip.

Most repairs in Bearwood need no application at all. What decides whether a change to the outside of your house does is who the council is, whether a conservation area or a listing applies, and whether the place sits in a protected landscape.