Beacon Basingstoke Roofing

Roofers in Viables

Viables is 2.4 road miles south of Basingstoke, one of our nearest estates, laid out around 1970 for London overspill with Hatch Warren and the A30 to the west and Brighton Hill to the north. Our free survey comes with photographs, followed by a written quote with the price fixed.

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Brick estate houses with concrete tile roofs among pine trees

Roofs we see in Viables

  • Brick estate houses with concrete tile roofs among pine trees

    Overspill estate houses from around 1970

    Viables was formed around 1970 as part of the Basingstoke Town Centre Development Plan, as estates were built for London overspill. Houses from that programme went up in repeating blocks, so a fault on one roof often appears along the whole terrace. After more than fifty years, the ridge bedding, verge mortar, felt and fascias are the parts we most expect to find worn.

  • Brick chimney stack with clay pots

    Garages and flat-roofed additions

    Many estate houses have a garage, a porch or a rear extension under a flat or low-pitched roof, and these are usually the first parts to leak. Original felt covers have long outlived their expected life, and some garage roofs of this age were corrugated sheets that need careful handling. A flat roof that has been patched three times is rarely worth a fourth patch.

  • A Hampshire village cottage of flint and brick with a steep clay plain tile roof

    Farm and industrial buildings at the edges

    The Viables Craft Centre sits on what was once an outlying farm, and the Viables Industrial Estate lies within the area as well. Converted farm buildings carry older, irregular roofs, while industrial units tend to have profile-sheet or membrane roofs with rooflights. Both are very different from a house roof, and we survey them on their own terms.

2.4 road miles south of Basingstoke

Planning and building control in Viables

The borough council covering Viables, Basingstoke and Deane, deals with both planning and building control. Because the area was laid out only from around 1970, most of its houses are modern in the planning sense, and ordinary repairs and re-covering seldom raise questions beyond building control. A small repair or re-cover that stays within the Planning Portal thresholds is not normally notifiable. A full strip and re-cover goes over that line, which means approval is required and the insulation of the whole roof may have to be improved.

If you are weighing a heavier covering on a house from this period, note that any weight increase of 15% or more also needs approval, as the structure may need strengthening. We deal with the building control application for any notifiable work. The old farm buildings by the Craft Centre are a different matter: before work on one, ask the borough's planning team at basingstoke.gov.uk whether it has any protection. For roof windows, see our roof window building regulations guide.

What we find on Viables roofs

An estate built in one burst ages in one burst. The houses went up together, so their weak points tend to fail within a few years of each other, and the neighbours often see the same symptoms. Alongside the houses there are garages, industrial units and a converted farm.

Chapter 1: Why is mortar falling from the gable ends of our Viables house?

What we find

The gable edge of a tiled roof is the verge. On estate houses from around 1970, the verge tiles were bedded onto a strip of mortar laid along the edge, with a pointed finish to seal it. That mortar has had five decades of frost and sun, and it shrinks, cracks and crumbles away from the tile ends. Once it goes, rain gets under the edge tiles and wind can lift them.

On a street of near-identical houses, a visible sign is a line of pale crumbs on the ground under the gable, or a verge that looks ragged against the next house. Inside, damp can appear on the gable wall at the top of the stairs or in the loft. The ridge along the top, bedded in the same mortar, is generally in a similar state, and the two are best looked at together.

What we fix

We check whether the tiles under the verge are sound, which they usually are, and rake out the old mortar. The edge is then rebuilt with a dry verge system: plastic or aluminium cappings that are screwed through to the batten and clip over the tile ends, so the edge is held mechanically rather than by mortar. This is the approach that the current standard BS 5534 expects for verge components, and dry-fix products come under BS 8612.

Ridge and hip tiles are done at the same visit, which saves putting the scaffold up twice. Your fixed quote follows the survey. For dry-fix ridge work, typical UK figures reported for a semi are £900 to £1,600, and scaffolding adds £300 to £900. See our ridge tile repairs page for the full picture.

Chapter 2: Our garage roof in Viables is leaking. Is it felt, or something worse?

What we find

Garages on the estates have flat or very shallow roofs, and the covering may be bitumen felt in several layers, a later repair coat, or corrugated sheeting. Felt fails by splitting at the joints, blistering in the sun and lifting at the edges. Water that gets in soaks the timber deck below, and a deck that is wet through begins to sag, which lets puddles gather and makes the next leak worse.

Corrugated sheets are another possibility on buildings of this age, and some of those were made of asbestos cement. They cannot be identified by eye with certainty. Grey sheets, mossy and cracked around the bolts, should be treated as suspect until tested. Do not drill, scrub, jet wash or walk on them, because that is how fibres are released. A felt roof is easier to read: bubbles, cracks and a spongy feel underfoot.

What we fix

Asbestos cement sheets can be removed carefully as non-licensed work under HSE guidance when they are kept whole, with a risk assessment, proper controls and trained people. If they would have to be broken up, the work becomes notifiable, so we plan it to avoid that. On a small garage, overlaying with a new roof can be an alternative to removal, and we say which suits yours.

For a felt garage we strip to the deck, replace soft boards and fit an EPDM rubber membrane or GRP. The survey comes before any price, and a typical UK range for an EPDM rubber roof on one garage is £1,200 to £2,500. Our garage roof replacement page compares the materials.

Chapter 3: Why are the fascias at our Viables house rotting beneath the gutters?

What we find

The fascia is the board that holds the gutter at the foot of the slope, and the soffit is the board under the overhang. On houses of this era the fascias were softwood, painted, and in many cases the paint has been renewed a few times and then let go. Once the surface is breached, the timber takes in water. A gutter that leaks at a joint or overflows over the top keeps the board wet from above.

The signs show from the ground: flaking paint, dark staining, a fascia that sags or whose joints have opened, and gutters that tilt away from the wall. Rot can run behind the board, hidden, where the rafter ends sit. Birds and wasps will exploit any gap in the soffit, so a hole there can mean both damp and an unwelcome tenant in the roof space.

What we fix

We take off a section of board to look at the rafter feet. Sound rafter ends stay, rotten ones are repaired by cutting out and splicing in new timber, and then the roofline is made good. Replacement fascias, soffits and gutters in uPVC need no repainting, and new gutter brackets are fixed at the proper spacing and fall so water runs to the outlet.

We also look at the felt or underlay at the eaves, because a torn eaves course is often the real reason the board is wet. Renewing the roofline in uPVC on a semi-detached house has a typical UK price of £1,800 to £3,500, and the final figure is fixed in writing after the survey. Our guttering, soffits and fascias page explains the process.

Chapter 4: The roof of our unit on the Viables Industrial Estate leaks. Where do we start?

What we find

Industrial and commercial units roof differently from houses. Typical coverings are profiled metal sheeting fixed to purlins, built-up bitumen felt or a single-ply membrane, with translucent rooflights to bring in daylight. Leaks tend to start at the laps and fixings of the sheeting, at the rooflights, along the gutter that runs between two bays, or at a damaged flashing where the roof meets a wall.

Do not stand on a rooflight or a weathered sheet. Old rooflights become brittle and can give way, and falls through fragile roofs remain among the most serious accidents in the trade. We approach the roof with proper access and edge protection. A tenant should also look at the lease, since the repairing obligation for the roof often sits with either the landlord or the occupier.

What we fix

The fix follows the cause. Failed sealant and fixings on sheeting are replaced, damaged sheets are changed, and rooflight surrounds are re-sealed or fitted new. A blocked or split box gutter, the long channel between two bays, is cleared and repaired or lined. Where an old membrane is finished, a new single-ply or built-up system can be laid over a prepared deck, planned so your business can keep trading.

If the sheets are asbestos cement, which is possible on older units, the work follows HSE guidance and is assessed before anything is touched. A typical UK range for a full commercial flat roof strip and replace is reported at about £90 to £180 or more per square metre, from a low-confidence source, so we price only after seeing the roof. See our commercial roofing page.

Viables roofing questions

Do you handle the roofs of units on the Viables Industrial Estate?

Yes. We do commercial roofing as well as residential. Industrial units usually have profiled sheeting, built-up felt or a single-ply membrane, and the faults tend to sit at the laps, rooflights and gutters. We survey, photograph and give a fixed written quote. Access and working hours can be agreed with the occupier or managing agent before any work starts, so the unit keeps trading where it can. The units sit beside the houses, and we cover both.

Do all the houses on our road need the same work, as they were built together?

They often share the same weak points, such as the verges, the ridge bedding and the eaves felt, but each roof has had a different history. One owner may have had repairs done, while the next door neighbour has not. We survey each roof individually and quote for what it needs, which is sometimes a repair on one house and a full re-cover on the one next to it.

Can you replace a flat-roof porch or rear extension roof without a full builder?

Yes. A flat roof is a roofing job: we strip the old covering, repair the deck, fit insulation where the work requires it and lay a new EPDM or GRP surface with fresh edge trims and flashings. If the project involves a new structure or a change to the walls, a builder is needed for that part. For re-covering alone, we handle the work and any building control side.

Is the Craft Centre building, once a farm, treated differently for roof repairs?

It can be. The Viables Craft Centre occupies what was once an outlying farm, and older farm buildings often have irregular roofs and traditional materials. Before work on an old building like that, check with Basingstoke and Deane's planning team whether any protection applies. We survey carefully, keep materials as close to the originals as we can, and put our findings in a photo report.

Nearby areas

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