Roofers in Lindford

The Victoria County History of 1908 lists Lindford among the hamlets of Headley parish and mentions its inn, the Royal Exchange. It also traces the southern Wey as it flows past Bramshott paper-mill to Lindford, where the river receives streams running down from Woolmer Forest. It is a small settlement in a river valley on the edge of heath, and that tells a roofer where to start. Roofs in a place like this are shaped less by one architectural period than by shelter, trees and damp ground, so every house gets judged on its own survey instead of on an assumption about the street. A hamlet also tends to mix old and new within a few hundred metres, which is one more reason the photographs of your own roof matter more than a general idea of the area.

1.1 Is the conservation area next door?

The River Wey Conservation Area follows the river from Hammer Bottom down to Headley Mill, passing Passfield and Standford along the way. East Hampshire District Council's leaflet shows that line, and Lindford itself is not inside a conservation area. In practice the boundary is the thing to check. A house a few paces from the river may sit just inside the line or just outside it, and the answer changes what the council expects to see on a roof. The council's planning team can confirm an address from its map, and a short email beats a guess.

1.2 Planning, permission and a plain re-roof

For a house outside a conservation area and not listed, putting back a roof that looks the same is not usually a planning matter, because the building's outward appearance is not materially changed. That reading carries caveats: a listing, or an Article 4 direction aimed at roofs, would change it. A written answer from the council's planning team settles any doubt, and it costs nothing to ask before ordering materials or booking a start date. East Hampshire's Article 4 direction of 31 January 2018 is about employment premises changing into dwellings, and no right over roofs is taken away by it. Our roof replacement and new roofs page explains how a full re-roof is surveyed and how the Building Regulations notification is handled when work is notifiable.

A hamlet that has had houses added across a century or more rarely settles on one house type, so a surveyor does not guess from the road. The loft and the roof surface tell the age, and the age tells what is worth repairing. A roof that is only moderately old and has dry timbers and sound battens may need ridge work and a handful of tiles. A much older one with a rotted underlay and rusted nails needs a very different quote. Neither is a reason to panic. Both are a reason to look before spending, since a roof that is dry inside today may still be shedding tiles you cannot see from the lane, and one that looks tired from the garden may have years left once the ridge and a few slipped tiles are put right.

3.1 What a loft inspection shows

From the hatch we look up at the covering from below for chinks of daylight and damp staining, and we examine the underlay, the membrane laid under the tiles to catch whatever gets past them. Old roofs may have bitumen felt that has cracked and gone brittle, or no felt at all, in which case wind-blown rain and snow can find their way through. Rafters and battens are checked for rot, woodworm and sagging. We note where earlier repairs have been made, because mismatched tiles and patches of mortar show where water has been a problem before. Nails matter more than most owners expect: on an older roof a tile can stay in place only because it is resting against its neighbours, and one gust of wind is all it takes to break that hold. This is why the photographs come first and the price second, and why a quote written without a loft visit is only a guess.

3.2 Ridges, verges and what the standard now asks

The ridge is the crest where the two main slopes meet, finished with a row of capping tiles. Since the 2014 revision of BS 5534 bedding them in mortar and nothing more is out of date, so each tile is fixed by a clip or screw too. The same logic applies at the verge, where the tiling ends at a gable wall and wind can get underneath. If your ridge is bedded on crumbling mortar, re-fixing it is a repair we would recommend ahead of a new roof. Our roof repairs page sets out how that decision is made. Elsewhere on the plot, the HSE tells owners to treat any shed or lean-to put up before 2000 as asbestos-bearing until it has been checked, so any such roof is raised at the survey stage.