Roof repairs in Leeds

Most of the roof repairs I do started as something small that stayed small because somebody looked at it. A slipped tile lets water onto the felt, the felt rots, and two winters later you are paying for a new roof instead of a morning of work.

I do the small jobs. The ones bigger firms will not send a van out for, because there is no margin in an hour on a ladder. That is most of my week, and it is how people find me before they need anything bigger.

If I get up there and it genuinely needs more than a repair, I will tell you that too. I would rather lose the job than sell you a patch that fails in a year.

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roof repairs on a typical Yorkshire house

Emergency callouts
Slipped and cracked tiles
Storm damage
Ridge re-bedding
Valley repairs

You probably need this if

Signs worth acting on

A damp patch on a bedroom ceiling, or a tide mark that grows after rain
Tiles on the ground after wind, or a visible gap in the roof line
Daylight through the roof when you are up in the loft
Mortar crumbling out from the ridge or around the chimney

How I do it

What the job involves

1
I trace the actual leak
Water travels along battens before it drops, so the wet patch inside is rarely under the hole. I check the loft first, then the roof.
2
Make safe the same visit if I can
If water is getting in, I stop that first, even if the permanent repair needs a dry day.
3
Written quote before anything starts
The price on the quote is the price on the invoice. If I find something underneath, I ring you before I do anything about it.

Before you ring anyone

What roof repairs cost

The reason nobody publishes this is that the honest answer is a range, and a range looks weak next to a firm number. It is still more use to you than no number at all, so here is the range and what decides where in it you land.

£450 to £1,500

Checkatrade puts roof repairs in Leeds between £448 and £1,526, averaging £816. That matches the shape of the work: most repairs are a few hundred pounds, and the ones that run past a thousand are usually scaffold jobs or a slope that has been left too long. A single slipped tile reached off a ladder is well under the bottom of that range.

What moves the number

How you get to it: A repair reachable from a ladder and one that needs a scaffold tower are different money before anyone touches a tile. Access is usually the biggest single line.
What has actually failed: Re-hooking a slipped slate is an hour. Re-bedding a ridge, rebuilding a valley or sorting flashing at a chimney is a day or more.
What the roof is made of: Concrete tile is cheap and available. Natural slate costs more, and reclaimed stone slate to match a conservation-area roof costs more again, because the material has to be found rather than ordered.
How long it has been left: Water that has been getting in for two winters has usually taken the battens and sometimes the felt with it. That is the difference between a repair and a re-roof, and it is why looking early is worth money.
Whether it is an emergency: Making a roof safe in the wet on the day you ring is a separate visit from the permanent repair on a dry one. Two visits, and worth it.

When a repair stops being the answer: on the Victorian slate through Headingley, Hyde Park and Kirkstall, nails corrode and slates start letting go one at a time. Past a certain point you are paying somebody every few months to put back a slate that was never the problem. At that stage re-hooking a whole slope at once is cheaper than the drip feed, and I will say so rather than take the repeat work.

On your street

Leeds roofs, and what actually goes wrong with them

Two kinds of roof cover most of my week. The Victorian terraces and back-to-backs through Headingley, Hyde Park, Woodhouse, Burley and Kirkstall are natural slate on softwood battens, and the failure is almost always nail sickness: the nails corrode, the slates let go one at a time, and you get a slipped slate a year until somebody re-hooks a whole slope at once.

The other is the interwar and 1930s semis out through Far Headingley, Weetwood, Adel, Moortown and Cookridge, laid in concrete interlocking tile. Those tiles outlive their mortar by decades, so the repairs there are ridges, hips and verges rather than the field of the roof. Leeds gets enough freeze-thaw cycles between November and March to open up any bedding mortar that was thin to start with.

Higher up, in Horsforth, Adel, Bramhope and out towards Otley, you get genuine stone slate. It is heavy, it is graded in diminishing courses up the roof, and it cannot be swapped for concrete tile on a whim, both because the rafters were built for that weight and because parts of these streets sit in conservation areas. A repair there means finding matching reclaimed stone, not the nearest thing on the merchant shelf.

Four jobs make up most of the roof repairs I do in this city, and it is worth knowing which one you are looking at before you ring anyone. A roof leak repair, where water is getting in and the job is finding out where from. A slipped roof tile or a missing one, which is an hour if it is caught and a wet loft if it is not. A cracked roof tile, which can usually be swapped rather than being a reason to re-cover a slope. And ridge or verge mortar that has dropped out, which is the commonest of the lot on the interwar semis and is not a leak yet.

Not sure if that is what you have got?

Send me a photo. I will tell you what I think it is and roughly what it costs, before anyone comes out.

Call 07770 902292

Roof Repairs: common questions

Can you fix a leaking roof in the rain?

I can make it safe and stop water getting in. The permanent repair usually needs a dry day, so I will do both trips rather than bodge one.

How do you find where a roof is leaking?

Water travels, so the wet patch inside is rarely under the hole. I trace it back from the loft, then check the roof itself. Guessing from the ground is how repairs get done twice.

Do you do roof surveys and inspections?

Yes. A survey before you buy, or on a house you already own that has not been looked at in years, comes with photographs of anything I find and a straight answer on whether it needs doing now, soon or not at all.

Can you repair storm damage and deal with the insurer?

Yes. I make it safe first, photograph the damage before anything is touched, and give you a written report and quote in the form insurers ask for.

How much should I pay for roof repairs?

Most roof repairs in Leeds land between £450 and £1,500, averaging around £800 according to Checkatrade. A single slipped tile off a ladder is well under that. What pushes a job up is access, whether a scaffold is needed, and how long the water has been getting in. Anyone giving you a firm price without seeing the roof is quoting a job they have not looked at.

How can you tell a dodgy roofer?

The reliable tells are all about paperwork and pressure rather than the work itself. A trader worth using gives you a written quote before starting, has an address you can find, will show you public liability insurance if you ask, and photographs what they found and what they did. The warning signs are a knock at the door saying they noticed your roof while passing, a price that only stands if you decide today, a demand for cash up front for materials, and a refusal to put the quote in writing. None of that requires you to know anything about roofing.

Does house insurance cover a roof leak?

Usually it covers sudden damage but not wear and tear. A storm taking tiles off is normally a claim. A roof that has been slowly failing for years is normally maintenance, and insurers decline it on that basis. This is why photographing storm damage before anything is touched matters, and why I do that first on any job likely to become a claim.

What is the cheapest way to repair a roof?

Looking at it early. Nearly every expensive roof I see started as one slipped tile that let water onto the felt, and the cost of putting that right doubles roughly every winter it is left. The genuinely cheap fix is the small one done on time. The false economy is sealant and spray coatings sold as a cheap alternative to a repair, which hide the problem rather than fix it and make the eventual job harder.

How much does a roof repair cost in Leeds?

Most small repairs, a slipped tile or a bit of flashing, land between £150 and £400. A bigger job needs a look first. I quote in writing before anything starts, and the quote is the price.

Do you charge for quotes?

No. I come out, look at the roof properly, and tell you what it needs. If it does not need doing, I will say so.

How quickly can you come out?

For a leak, usually the same day or the next morning. I will get it watertight first and sort the proper repair once the weather allows.

Are you insured?

Yes, fully insured for public liability. Ask to see the certificate and I will send it over before I start.