Block garage roofs
Re-roofing a garage in a block or row
The short answer
A garage in a block can be re-roofed on its own, but only after you know who owns the roof and what it shares with its neighbours. Some blocks have a single roof over several garages, others have separate roofs butted together. Check your title or lease first, then agree access and any shared gutter with the people next door before the work is priced.
What changes when your garage is one of a row: ownership, shared edges, access and the details that stop a leak crossing into next door.
Whose roof is it, and who pays for it
Start with the paperwork. Garages in a block are often sold with a title that covers only the box inside the walls, or with a lease that makes a landlord or management company responsible for the structure. A freehold garage on a private court might be yours entirely, roof included. A garage behind a block of flats is more likely to belong to the freeholder.
Check your title plan or lease before you book anyone, and ask the managing agent if there is one. Reading the documents is a job for a solicitor or your agent, while our survey records what the roof itself needs. If the garages share a roof, the repair usually has to be agreed between owners, and a single contractor doing the whole run is often tidier than several patches. Photographs from the survey give you something concrete to send to neighbours when you ask them to share the cost.
Shared walls, parapets and the edge between garages
In a row, each garage shares a wall with the next. At roof level that wall may rise as a small parapet, a low upstand of masonry, or stop below the roof surface. Water can cross the line at either point. Where a parapet stands, its top is capped and its foot is flashed, which means lead or a membrane turned up the face so rain cannot get behind it.
On a flat roof shared across two or more garages, the join between sections is the place to look for failure. Stained ceilings along a party line, damp patches near the top of a dividing wall and daylight at a joint are the usual signs. Any work that touches a wall you share with a neighbour needs a conversation with them first, and legal advice if the wall is to be cut or altered. To trace where a leak enters, our page on leaking garage roofs explains how a leak is traced.
Access, scaffold and the neighbours
Most garage blocks sit on a rear court, a lane or a service road, where cars come and go. Getting materials onto the roof takes planning. A pitched or flat roof only a few feet above the ground can usually be reached with ladders and a hoist. A taller block or a roof over a courtyard may need scaffolding, and poles over a pavement or lane need a licence from the highway authority. West Sussex County Council asks for at least ten working days' notice, so book early.
Tell the other garage owners the dates. If they park cars or store things inside, a roof strip can drop dust and debris through gaps, and sheeting or stored goods may need moving. We cover the open roof each evening, sweep the court as we go, and haul the stripped material off site when the work is done. If the block carries any cement sheeting, the asbestos questions on our asbestos garage roof page apply before a single sheet is moved.
What the new roof usually looks like
Most block garages carry a flat or shallow-pitched roof, so the choice is generally between felt, rubber and glass-fibre membranes. Guides put EPDM at 20 to 30 years, GRP at 25 to 40, and torch-on felt at 10 to 20, all typical and none guaranteed. BS 6229:2025 sets a minimum finished fall of 1:80 on flat roofs, which a long run of garages needs, since water has further to travel.
Edges deserve attention in a block. The front fascia or trim, the rear gutter and the side upstands all have to line up with the neighbours, so the row still looks like a row afterwards. If the garage roof also meets a house or flat wall, lead flashing, a metal strip that closes the gap, finishes that joint. We look at the gutter and downpipe on the same visit, because a blocked outlet at the end of a long run is a frequent reason for ponding. Old gutters on a row often sag together, and replacing only one length leaves the rest to fail. Our EPDM garage roof page covers the rubber option in detail.
Cost for one garage in a block
Checkatrade's roof replacement guide, updated in October 2026, quotes a garage re-felt at about £1,000 to £2,000, averaging near £1,500. A single garage in a block can land in that range, and easy access with ladders and a short carry keeps it down. A block with a tall courtyard that needs a scaffold and a licence pushes it up. Shared gutters and a parapet to flash add work as well.
Whatever price you are given, find out if it carries VAT, and whether scaffold hire sits inside it. After we survey your garage, you receive one written figure for the whole job. Where a neighbour wants the same work done in the same week, a combined job is worth asking about, since the scaffold and the visit are shared between the owners, and the neighbours get a row that matches. Our garage roof replacement page sets out what each stage involves.
Related questions
Garage block roof questions
Can I re-roof my garage without asking the owners of the other garages?
If your garage has its own roof and the work stays on your side of the line, usually yes, but your title or lease may say otherwise. If the roof is shared or the work touches a shared wall or gutter, talk to the others first. A short letter with survey photographs helps.
Will a new roof on one garage make the row look odd?
It can, if the colour or trim differs from its neighbours. We match the edge details and finish where we can. Where the whole row is tired, doing it as one job gives a more even result.