Roofing in Redlynch
Repairs, dry ridge and verge, re-covers, flat roofs, leadwork and guttering across Redlynch, Woodfalls and Morgan's Vale.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
Re-covering a roof in Redlynch needs no permission at all on an unlisted house. Turning the loft under it into a bedroom is a different matter, and it is the one planning question in this village that catches people out.
Redlynch runs a long way. Morgan's Vale, Woodfalls and the top of the hill are all part of it, and the roofs change as you go along: post-war and 1960s houses and bungalows on the newer plots, older cottages dotted between them. Most people ring us for one of two reasons. Water is coming through a ceiling and they want it stopped. Or the roof has reached the age where every winter brings another tile down and they want to know whether to keep patching.
What we do about it is the same either way. Come out, get on the roof, look in the loft, and photograph the battens, the underlay and the rafter feet, which is where the answer usually is. You get told plainly whether you are looking at a repair, edge work, or a covering that has finished. The site visit and the written itemised quote are both free.
The work
A spread out roof is nearly all edge
A spread out roof is nearly all edge. Four in ten houses here are detached and three in ten are bungalows, and a spread out single storey roof carries a lot of edge for the floor area under it. Every hip is a run of mortar bedding that has been weathering since the house was built, and once it cracks the tiles start rocking. We take it off and fit dry ridge and dry verge screwed onto a ventilated roll, the mechanical fixing BS 5534 expects.
Over a quarter of Redlynch predates 1919. On the post-war houses it is concrete tile, mostly interlocking, and the covering nearly always outlives the nail or clip holding it, so the fault is a fixing. On the older cottages it is plain tile, clay tile or natural slate on battens with no sarking beneath, and there it is the tile that has finally worn out. Thatch we decline and say so up front: tiling and flashing to the edge of it is ours, the thatch is a thatcher's.
Rusted nails, soft batten ends and an underlay that tears in your fingers all arrive together, and that is when patching stops being value for money. The covering comes off, wet rafter feet come out, and it goes back on breathable membrane and treated battens with a matched tile. On a long low roof the area surprises people, so it is worth having the re-cover priced next to the repair rather than assuming. Where a flat roof runs into a tiled slope rather than up a wall, that junction is the part that fails. Chimney flashings, soakers, valleys and abutments in code rated lead. Shaded northern slopes hold moss, and clearing debris out of a valley is maintenance rather than repair, and Approved Document L sets the standard a renovated roof is expected to reach once the covering is off.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
Same team from first visit to last, no sub-contracting, and an itemised quote: scaffold, the strip out, battens and membrane, the covering, each junction and disposal on separate lines. Redlynch is in Wiltshire, so Wiltshire Council is your planning and building control authority, and there is no conservation area in the village. On an unlisted house a repair, a like for like re-cover, new rainwater goods and rooflights all sit inside ordinary householder permitted development, as long as nothing projects more than 150mm above the roof plane and the Planning Portal guidance limits are met. Twelve entries in the parish are listed and those need consent whatever the work.
Cost
What decides the price of a roof
No rate per square metre. Redlynch sits on a slope and a good few plots do too, so the scaffold often has to be built off uneven or falling ground, which takes longer than a flat drive. The lanes are narrow in places and a scaffold lorry cannot always reach the house. This is work at height and the work at height rules are why the platform is a priced line rather than an optional extra. Chimneys, valleys and abutments are priced one at a time. Ask who pays for the skip.
If it is leaking now
Water coming in today
Ring rather than emailing. Anything letting water in comes first and the first visit makes it safe and watertight. Move what is under the stain, then look at the roof from the garden and the road, because on a long low house you can see most of the covering without leaving the ground. Tell us if the water is showing near the chimney, since that changes what comes on the van.
Worth knowing
The loft conversion question, before you book a scaffold
Redlynch drains into the Solent catchment, which is under nutrient neutrality rules. For a roof they are irrelevant, and nobody should tell you otherwise: repairs, re-covering, leadwork, gutters and rooflights add nothing and engage nothing. What the rules do engage is any scheme that adds overnight accommodation, and a loft conversion that creates a bedroom is exactly that.
The practical consequence is about sequence rather than cost. If a conversion is in your plans at all, get the planning question answered before the roof comes off, not after. A permission that needs nutrient mitigation takes time to sort with Wiltshire Council, and the two jobs want to happen in one go: insulating at rafter level, forming the openings and setting out any rooflight are all straightforward with the covering off and awkward once it is back on.
Do them together and you pay for one platform instead of two. The Planning Portal notes on other permissions you may require is the place to start.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
About twenty miles from us and on that side most weeks, covering Redlynch, Morgan's Vale, Woodfalls, Lover and the SP5 addresses south of Downton, with Wiltshire Council for planning and building control. 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
Redlynch questions we get asked
What goes back on a pre 1900 roof around here?
Whatever came off it, as near as we can get. Getting on for a quarter of Redlynch was built before 1900, so on those roofs we salvage and re-lay the sound covering, buy reclaimed to make up the shortfall, and use lime rather than cement wherever mortar is exposed. Cement on an old wall traps water in the fabric below it. The survey sets out how much of the original we expect to save.
Which council do we apply to at Redlynch?
Wiltshire Council. It catches people out here, because the postal address points people at the wrong planning portal and the advice they then read does not apply. For a like for like re-cover it makes no odds, since there is no conservation area over Redlynch and that work is permitted development anyway. It matters for the twelve listed entries, for a skip licence on the highway, and for anything altering the roof line.
It is a big spread of roof. Which part comes first?
The lines rather than the middle. Forty two per cent of Redlynch is detached and another thirty per cent is bungalows, so these are wide, low roofs with a long run of eaves and gutter for the area they cover. That is where the moss collects, where the felt sags and where water backs up. We price the eaves, the gutter line and the valleys first and only then talk about the covering itself.
The slope under the trees is thick with moss. Scrape it?
Not with a scraper, and not with a pressure washer either, because both strip the surface off the tile and drive water up under the laps. On an old covering that is how a sound roof starts leaking. We brush it off dry, clear the gutters out, and cut back whatever is shading the slope, since the moss returns within a season if that side never sees the sun.
Will the job stop if it rains for a week?
The stripping stops, the rest carries on. We will not open a slope on a bad forecast, so through a wet spell the crew works on the scaffold, the leadwork, the gutters and any timber repair and takes the covering off when a window appears. That is why the quote sets the job out in stages instead of promising a single finish date. No roof of ours gets left open waiting on the weather.
Nearby, and next door
Roofing near Redlynch
Roofing nearby
Our other trades in Redlynch
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Get a price for your Redlynch roof
Send the postcode and what you have noticed. We come out, look in the loft as well as on the roof, and put an itemised price in writing.