Roofers on a slate roof along a limestone village street

Roofers in Taw Hill

Repairs, replacement coverings, ridge and verge work and flat roofs across Taw Hill, from the first houses of the late 1990s to the garages and porches that have aged faster than the main roofs.

Get a quote Call 01793 626096

Taw Hill's roofs, one estate at a time

Concrete tile roofs on an estate — The first phase of the estate

A February 2002 article in Swindon Link records that Taywood Homes, later Bryant Homes, built the Taw Hill estate and that the first residents moved in between 1996 and 1999. That puts the earliest roofs at around three decades old. A concrete-tiled roof of that age is now reaching the stage when small faults start to appear together. Typical ones are mortar crumbling under the ridge, underlay that has become brittle at the eaves, and lead flashing at a chimney or a bay window that has lifted. Concrete tiles are often quoted as lasting 30 to 60 years, so most of these roofs have plenty of life left if the details are kept sound.

Gable ends and ridges on semi-detached homes — Gables, hips and shared runs

Estates built in a single push tend to repeat a handful of house types, and that matters for repairs. If one gable end has a loose verge, the same house type three doors along often has the same weakness. The verge, where the tiling stops against a gable wall, was commonly bedded in mortar on houses like these. Over time the mortar cracks, the tiles at the edge lose their grip and the wind finds them first. Hip tiles and ridge tiles follow the same pattern. When we survey a house, we look along the whole roofline, photograph each detail and tell you which fixings are sound and which are only holding because the weather has been kind.

A flat porch roof and garage — Porches, garages and extensions

Away from the main slopes, the smaller roofs on an estate like this often age fastest. Flat porch canopies, integral garage roofs and kitchen extensions with a low pitch or a flat deck are common additions across suburban Swindon. Felt, GRP and EPDM are the usual coverings on flat roofs, and each fails in its own way: felt splits at laps and upstands, GRP cracks where the deck flexes, and EPDM lets go at corners where the adhesive never took properly. A leak from one of these can look like a fault in the main roof, so we trace where the water is really entering before recommending a repair or a replacement.

Where Taw Hill sits

Distance: 4 road miles north-west of central Swindon
Council: Swindon Borough Council
Parish: Haydon Wick, in Swindon Borough
Conservation area: None, according to the council's list
Setting: Late-1990s northern expansion of Swindon

Roof questions from Taw Hill

Is a 1990s Taw Hill roof due for replacement yet?

Not by age alone. Concrete tiles are often quoted at 30 to 60 years. We check the underlay, battens, ridge and flashings, because those usually need attention first.

Do Taw Hill houses need consent for roof work?

Swindon's conservation area register does not include Taw Hill, so a matching re-roof rarely needs a planning application. Bigger re-roofs can bring Building Regulations into play, and we explain and notify those.

Why does my Taw Hill porch roof leak but the main roof is dry?

Small flat and low-pitched roofs fail at laps, corners and the junction with the wall. They are repaired or recovered separately from the main slopes.

What fails first on a Taw Hill estate roof?

Lead-lined valley gutter between two slate roof slopes

Rainwater running off slates into a black gutter and downpipe

The short answer

Usually not the tiles. On a roof of this age the first faults tend to be at the details: mortar under the ridge and along the verges, lead or flashing at chimneys and bay windows, and the underlay at the eaves. These can be repaired on their own long before the covering needs replacing.

A roof built in the late 1990s has been through a lot of seasons. Most of the tiles will be fine. The trouble is almost always in the parts that join one surface to another.

What are the ridge, hip and verge?

Three terms are worth knowing. The ridge crowns the roof where two slopes meet. A hip runs down the sloping corner of a hipped roof. The verge finishes the tiling beside a gable wall. On houses from this decade all three were usually bedded in sand and cement. The mortar cracks, shrinks and eventually falls out in pieces, and you may find fragments in the gutter or on a path. Under BS 5534:2014 a bed of mortar no longer counts as the whole fixing. A modern repair puts clips or screws through the tiles as well, or swaps to a tested BS 8612:2018 dry-fix ridge.

Where do flashings and valleys leak?

Flashing means the metal, usually lead, folded between roof and brickwork at a chimney, a bay or a party wall. Once an edge lifts, rain follows the gap, and the stain often appears on a ceiling a metre or two away. A valley is the internal angle between two slopes, and its lining takes a lot of water. We check these with the tiles lifted only where we have to, and photograph what we find.

How do you check the underlay?

Underlay is the membrane under the tiles. At the eaves it can sag into the gutter or perish where it was cut short. We look from inside the loft with a torch as well as from outside, because the loft shows daylight, damp timber and wet insulation that nothing outside would reveal.

Wind-driven rain shows up faults that a dry day hides. After a storm, a quick look from the pavement for slipped tiles, a sagging ridge line or a gutter full of grit tells you whether to call us, and you can send photographs through WhatsApp if you would rather not climb a ladder.

Our pages on ridge, verge and dry-fix work and roof repairs set out how each repair is done.

Should I repair or re-roof a Taw Hill house?

The answer

Repair if the faults are confined to one area and the tiles are sound. Re-roof when the battens are failing across whole slopes, the underlay has perished, or repairs keep returning. Our advice is to pay only for the work the fault demands, and the survey photographs show you which side of that line your roof sits on.

Owners on an estate of this age often wonder whether it is time for a new roof or whether patching can go on. The answer comes from what the photographs show, not from the date the houses were built.

When is a repair enough?

A slipped tile, a cracked hip, a loose verge or a lifted flashing is a repair. If the tiles are sound and the timbers dry, a targeted job is far cheaper than a new roof and gives the existing covering many more years. We will tell you that plainly, even where a bigger job would suit us better.

When is it time to re-cover?

A re-roof makes sense when the problems are spread across a whole slope. Signs include tiles that are crumbling at the surface, battens that are soft or snapping, underlay that has split, and repeated leaks in different places. In those cases patching only moves the leak. Stripping, re-battening, fitting new underlay and re-laying with new tiles gives the roof a fresh start, backed by our ten-year written workmanship guarantee.

What drives the cost?

Size and pitch come first, then access for scaffolding, the number of chimneys and dormers, and how much timber needs replacing once the old covering is off. Typical national figures for a full re-tile range widely, and your own price comes in writing once we have surveyed the house.

Where a re-roof goes ahead, every scrap of waste leaves with us at the end, and the guarantee comes in writing, so the job closes with paperwork as well as a tidy driveway.

The roof replacement page explains the steps and what each stage involves, from scaffold to clear-up.

Our view

Fix the details first, and re-cover only when the battens and underlay tell you the whole slope is done.

Does a Taw Hill re-roof need Building Regulations?

Rolled lead roof covering over a bay above white windows

Brick end-of-terrace gable beside a limestone house, slate roofs

The short answer

Sometimes. No application is normally required while under 25 per cent of the total building envelope and less than 50 per cent of the roof is involved. Bigger jobs need approval, and an insulation upgrade may follow. Swindon Borough Council runs its own building control, and we handle the notification when work is notifiable.

Taw Hill lies within Swindon Borough, so the council's own building control team is the public route and a registered building control approver is the private one. Which of the two matters, if either, comes down to how large a part of the roof is being redone.

Where are the thresholds?

The Planning Portal puts the usual exemption at less than 25 per cent of the total building envelope and less than 50 per cent of the roof is involved. Work beyond either limit needs Building Regulations approval, and Part L may then call for better insulation. Approval is also needed where the new covering is 15 per cent or more heavier, which can matter when a lightweight roof is swapped for a heavier tile.

Is planning permission needed?

The council's conservation areas page does not list Taw Hill, and no Article 4 direction applies here. A like-for-like re-roof does not usually need planning permission. Roof windows and dormers are a different matter, and our skylights page covers the planning side properly.

Who does the paperwork?

We explain which route applies at the survey stage. Where the work is notifiable, we handle the Building Regulations notification for you, and the forms never land on your doormat. For a straightforward repair of a few tiles or a ridge, none of this arises, and you simply get the quote.

Homeowners sometimes assume a new roof means a pile of forms. In practice, most estate re-roofs run to a short conversation at the survey, a decision on whether the insulation in the loft is affected, and a note of the route we will use. We put the route in writing alongside the quote, so the paperwork is settled before the scaffold goes up.

If you are unsure what your house needs, the council's planning team can confirm whether anything unusual applies to your address.

MythAny new roof on an estate house needs Building Regulations approval.

FactSmaller jobs under the thresholds do not normally need an application; larger re-roofs do.

Roofing services in Taw Hill

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Questions from the Taw Hill estate

My Taw Hill roof was built in the 1990s: when should I get it looked at?

A survey makes sense when you see a stained ceiling, loose tiles in the garden or mortar fragments in the gutter. Roofs of that age are rarely finished, but the details at ridge, verge and flashing are the parts that wear first. A written quote and photographs of your own roof show which parts are sound and which are failing, so you can plan repairs on your timetable.

Is a leaking Taw Hill garage or porch canopy worth repairing?

Yes. We find where the water enters, then repair a split, re-seal an upstand or recover the whole deck in a modern single-ply or GRP system. A small flat roof is often quicker to deal with than a pitched slope, and we tell you whether a repair will hold or a new covering is the better value.

Why do the houses on one Taw Hill street develop the same faults?

Estates were built in phases using the same house types, materials and methods. If one gable verge has failed, neighbours with the same design are likely to follow. It is worth a check of the shared details, such as verges, valleys and hips, rather than waiting for each house to leak in turn.

Will a loose ridge tile in Taw Hill get worse?

Yes, usually. Once the bedding has gone, a ridge tile can move in each gust, and the next one lifts it further. We re-bed it with mechanical fixings as well as mortar, since BS 5534:2014 no longer relies on mortar alone, and check the neighbouring tiles at the same visit.

Ask us about your roof

Tell us what’s happening and we’ll call you back.

Photos of what we find
A written quote
10-year workmanship guarantee

Or call 01793 626096