What Are the Eaves of a Roof?

The parts of the eaves

The eaves look like a simple edge, but several components make them up. The rafters, the sloping timbers that carry the roof, extend past the wall by a short distance, and their ends are called the rafter feet. Across their ends runs the fascia, the board you see from the ground, which carries the gutter. Under the overhang, the soffit is the flat board that closes the gap between the fascia and the wall.

At the top of the wall sits the wall plate, a timber that spreads the roof load. The first course of tiles, called the eaves course, is laid doubled or on an eaves tile so the line stays straight, and an eaves tray or felt support lifts the underlay into the gutter. Between all of these, a ventilation gap lets air in.

What the eaves are for

The overhang does three jobs. It throws water clear of the wall, which keeps the brickwork drier and protects the foundations from splashing. It supports the gutter, which collects the rain and leads it to the downpipe. And it provides the opening for air to enter the loft, which stops condensation building up in the roof timbers.

On older houses the overhang is often small, and on some Georgian and Victorian terraces the roof sits behind a parapet instead, so there are no eaves at all. Bungalows and many modern estate houses have wide overhangs, which give more protection but also catch more wind. Our page on what a gable roof is explains the other edge of a roof, the sloping end.

How eaves go wrong

Eaves are exposed to every shower and are hard to see. A blocked or leaking gutter spills water over the fascia, which rots the board and the rafter feet behind it. A fascia board with a soft, flaking surface or black spots at the joints is a sign of that. Soffits can sag, stain or split, and gaps let in birds, wasps and squirrels.

Underlay is another weak point. If it does not reach the gutter, rain runs behind the fascia and rots the timbers. A tile that has slipped at the eaves course allows water to run down the wall. Our answer on what causes slipped roof tiles covers why that occurs.

Ventilation at the eaves

A cold loft needs air to move through it. Vents in the soffit, or a continuous strip behind the fascia, let air in at the bottom, while the ridge or high-level vents let it out. Insulation pushed hard into the eaves can block this path, so installers fit a plastic tray to hold it back. If the vents are painted over or blocked with insulation, condensation follows and can damp the rafters and mould the underside of the felt.

Our page on whether you need tile vents explains the other part of the ventilation picture.

Eaves on different kinds of house

The detail changes with the age and style of the property. A Victorian terrace often has a boxed timber cornice or a deep brick corbel with a cast iron gutter, while a 1930s semi tends to have a plain overhang with a painted timber fascia. Post-war estates and newer homes mostly have shallow overhangs finished in uPVC, with ventilation strips built in. Cottages in the older villages around Hampshire and Berkshire may have open eaves, where the rafter ends are visible and the tiles simply stop above the wall.

Open eaves look attractive but are exposed to birds and weather, and they need sound rafter feet and careful gutter brackets fixed to the rafters. Whatever the style, the aims are the same: keep the wall dry, hold the gutter level and let the roof breathe.

Why the first row of tiles is different

The eaves course is not an ordinary row. The bottom tile has to project far enough to drop water into the gutter, but not so far that wind catches it. On plain-tile roofs the first row is doubled, using shorter eaves tiles, so the line of tiles above sits at the right angle. If the course is laid short, water runs behind the gutter, and if it is laid long, the tiles become unstable.

Repairing and replacing eaves

Repair depends on how far the damage has spread. A section of rotten fascia can be cut out and replaced, and a failed soffit board swapped, but if the rafter feet are soft, they need to be cut back and spliced with sound timber. Replacement fascias and soffits are often made of uPVC, which needs no painting but should still be fixed to sound timber and have its vents kept clear.

We look at the eaves from a ladder or scaffold during the survey, and show you photographs of the rafter feet, the underlay and the gutter line. More on our tiled-roof work is on the pitched roofing page.