Roofing in Sopley

The covering, and what holds it. Slipped, cracked and missing tile work, storm damage, and a leak traced back to where water genuinely enters rather than patched where the stain shows.

The older property near the church and the river carries plain clay tile and natural slate, and the later houses in the village carry concrete interlocking tile. There is no stone slate on this side of the county. On interlocking concrete the tile outlasts what holds it down, so the fault is usually a nail, a clip, a batten end or a junction. The covering itself is fine.

Ridge, hip and verge. The first weak point in the village, and where roofs went on within a few years of each other it tends to come round for those houses at once. Mortar bedding shrinks and cracks, the wind gets under the tile and it starts to rock, and a verge loses its bedding along a gable. The most exposed elevation here faces south west, and wind works at the edges and the openings rather than the middle of a surface, which is why the edge goes first. We take it off and convert to a dry fix system, dry ridge and dry verge screwed onto a ventilated roll, the mechanical fixing BS 5534 expects, which also ventilates the roof space along the ridge. It is priced by the metre of edge, so it costs a fraction of a re-cover.

Where houses in Sopley are joined, the covering carries on over the boundary and so does the water. A leak that shows in your back bedroom often gets in above next door's, and the repair has to be done from a scaffold that stands over both. We knock on the door, agree it and photograph both sides so nobody argues later about who paid for what. On a joined roof the valley between two pitches and the abutment against a rear extension are where the leadwork hours go, and where the cheap fix always fails first. Flashings, soakers, valleys and abutments go in code rated lead, cut so it can move without splitting.

When the nails have rusted through, the batten ends have softened and the old felt tears as soon as it is touched, a new roof is the honest answer. The covering comes off, soft rafter feet and wet timber are replaced, and it goes back on breathable membrane and treated battens with a matched tile. Roofs of this age have no sarking board, so the underlay is the whole of the second defence. The rear extension, the garage and the porch go in felt, GRP fibreglass or EPDM rubber, and on this stock the flat roof usually runs into the main slope, which is the junction where they let go. On a terrace one blocked downpipe backs the whole run up. While the covering is off, insulation and eaves ventilation cost far less to put right, and Approved Document L sets the standard a renovated roof is expected to reach.

Access across a terrace. A scaffold for a mid-terrace roof has to stand across the front of next door, and materials often come through a side gate by hand. That is more work than the same platform against a detached house or a bungalow, and work at height rules are why it is a priced line of its own.

Edges that aged together. Roofs put on within a few years of each other tend to fail in the same places: the mortar bedding at the ridge and verge, the first course at the eaves, and flashings where the roof meets a wall. A lot of that is edge work rather than a full re-cover, and fixing to BS 5534, the code of practice for slating and tiling means mechanically fixed ridge and verge rather than another round of mortar.

What sits under the tiles. Older roofs often have a bitumen felt that has gone brittle at the eaves, and battens that are sound in the middle but soft at the ends. Thomas looks from the loft before pricing, so the quote says whether the underlay and battens are being renewed or left.

Weather off the south west. The most exposed side of the village faces south west, and driven rain works at verges, chimneys and valleys first. A roof leaking on that side is priced around those details, not by the square metre.

When you compare quotes, ask whether the scaffold is included and who talks to the neighbours, whether the battens and membrane are new or reused, and how the ridge and verge will be fixed.

Walk through Sopley and you will see roofs of different ages side by side. Where a row did go up together, that changes the advice more than anything else on this page, because roofs that went on together wear out together.

What ages first on a pitched tiled roof is not the tile. It is the mortar along the ridges, hips and verges, and the nails and battens beneath. So when one house in a row built together starts shedding mortar, the rest are a season or two behind, and the right answer for most of them is edge work, not the re-cover a passing trader will quote for.

So if a neighbour has just had ridge and verge done, have yours looked at now, before the next gale. And if somebody quotes a new roof, ask them to show you the batten ends and the nail heads, because those are what decide it.

Sopley is 3.7 miles from our base in Boscombe, and we cover the village, Sopley Common, Ripley and the BH23 addresses between Bransgore and the Avon. New Forest District Council is the planning authority. The firm is Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719. Before you book a visit in Sopley, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.

It is Thomas Hannen's business, and Thomas gets on the roof and prices it himself. A verified customer gave us 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit costs you nothing, and neither does the written, itemised quote.

Most repairs in Sopley 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.