Sagging Roof

lennon09

Have just had structural survey done on house I am looking to buy and its come back to say roof is sagging due to replacing slates with heavier tiles about 10 years ago

Am still looking to buy the house was wondering if anyone had an idea how much it costs?

Is it just a simple matter of reinforcing or a new roof.

Am looking to go back to the seller and see if they will knock any money off

cheers

muskoka

Huh - I'd be very wary (I'm no expert). I wanted to buy a house in 2007 but survey advised needed new roof, vendors and estate agents even got a quote for 5K for a new roof. I knew better thank goodness. I spoke to http://www.nfrc.co.uk/ as the quote the estate agent had got for the roof was for the wrong tiles and were much heavier than the orginal roof tiles, hence would have caused a sagging roof. I'd check this out very carefully.

Hope I made sense, but estate agents quote for roof was 5K. The true cost was 19K for the correct tiles. (I got a quote). Roof required much more expensive, lighter tiles. I didnt proceed with sale. Good luck

Debt_Free_Chick

At a guess - and more info could be useful - this is a pre-1950s house, possibly Victorian, that originally had slate tiles. Those tiles have been replaced by, probably, pre-fabricated concrete .....

If that is so, then the wooden structure of the roof space was never intended to support the weight of concrete tiles.

Usually, this is easily remedied by the insertion of additional purlins ... timber pieces put across the (timber) frame of the roof.

But you need to give us more info.

If it's additional purlins, then I would budget £1,000 for one purlin, £1,500 for two ...... and somewhere between £1,800 and £2,000 for three. But it depends.

Any more info?

lennon09

yes built in 1900 and must have had slate before, we know the roof was replaced about 10 years ago and the tiles are in good knick, but as you say think it was a matter of not enough additional support for the heavier tiles.

I'm just hooping its a matter of adding extra support and not replacing the roof.

martindow

Is it possible that the extra weight could also be forcing the walls apart? Much more work than just a roof.

Radsteral

i have had a similar experience when i refurbished a house. we had to remove all tiles, as the frame wasnt great, reinforced properly and put back same tiles ata cost of 37000 scafold included on price

lennon09

hadn't thought of that. really hope not as would assume thats a lot of work and would probably have to walk away from the sale. its a terraced house if that makes any difference

Trying to get a few builders to see if they can give a quote and would assume once the EA is informed they will speak to vendor to see if they want to get quotes and if they would be willing to reduce sale price to get the sale

the initial survey said that the roof may need some structural support at some point in the future, and then the full structural servey confirmed it and so guess we now need to know exactly whats needed.

fingers crossed its not a major job.

ILW

Radsteral wrote: »

i have had a similar experience when i refurbished a house. we had to remove all tiles, as the frame wasnt great, reinforced properly and put back same tiles ata cost of 37000 scafold included on price

£37k sound a bit steep, is it a church?

Radsteral

oh Sorrrryyyyyyyyyy.. meant 3700!

lennon09

thanks for that.
fingers crossed its nothing major and £3700 sounds a lot cheaper than I was expecting, to strengthen.

suppose the next step is speaking to EA and seeing if anything can be knocked off the sale price, suppose I need to sort out quotes once I speak to them.

mlz1413

I replaced my vic terraced house roof in 2005 at £2.5k, all scaffold, reinforcing and old tiles removed included.

Reinforcing is best done when old roof is off to get in new timbers, if the old ones have now sagged then it maybe difficult / impossible to just reinforce now. Ask vendors if you can take a roofer around and get loft access for a estimate.