Re-Roofing in Tauranga

When It Is Time to Replace a Roof

Tauranga has an unusual amount of housing that went up in the 1960s and 70s, particularly through Otumoetai, Greerton, Gate Pa and Judea. A great many of those roofs are now hitting the end of their working life at roughly the same time, which is why re-roofing is the single biggest part of what we do.

These are the signs that a roof has moved past repair:

• The coating has gone chalky or is peeling across the whole roof, not just on one face. Once the paint system has failed the steel underneath is exposed and rust follows.
• Fixings are lifting in more than one place. One or two backing out is a repair. Dozens of them means the timber underneath has moved or the roof has been working loose for years.
• Rust around the fixings, the laps or the flashings, especially anywhere water sits after rain.
• Concrete tiles that are cracking, delaminating or losing their surface. Older concrete tile roofs shed their coating and go porous, and the extra weight of water they then hold is not doing your framing any favours.
• You have paid for repairs more than once in the last few years. At some point the repairs stop being cheaper than the replacement.
• Stains on the ceiling. By the time it shows inside, water has usually been getting in for a while.

None of these means you definitely need a new roof. We will come and look, and if it has ten good years left we will tell you that.

How a Re-Roof Actually Runs

Most homes are done inside a week. A straightforward single-storey house is often two to three days on the roof once the scaffold is up; a large or complex two-storey home can be a fortnight.

1. Scaffold and edge protection

   Goes up first, on every job, single-storey included. It is what makes the work safe and it is also why the finished edges are neat - a roofer working off a ladder is not doing their best work.

2. Stripped in sections, closed in each day

   We work across the roof in manageable sections rather than opening the whole house up at once, and everything is closed in and made watertight before we leave for the day.

3. Inspect and repair the timber

   This is the part you are paying for that you will never see. Rotten purlins, damaged battens and previous bad repairs get sorted now, while the roof is off, because it costs almost nothing at this stage and a fortune later.

4. Underlay, then the new roof

   New underlay, new flashings, new fixings. We do not reuse old flashings to save a few dollars - they are the parts that fail.

5. Spouting, clean-up and a walk around

   New spouting if it is part of the job, all the old roofing taken away, a magnet run over the lawn and gardens for stray fixings, and a walk around with you at the end.

Choosing What Goes Back On

A re-roof is the one chance you get to change the look of the house, and it is worth thinking about rather than defaulting to the same thing that is up there now.

Longrun metal is the most common choice: best value per square metre, huge colour range, very long life when it is specified correctly for the coast. Asphalt shingles are much quieter in heavy rain and suit complex hip roofs and character homes. Architectural tray is the premium option where the roof is a design feature.

One thing worth knowing: replacing concrete tile with metal takes a lot of weight off the structure, which is generally a good thing, but going the other way needs the framing checked first. We will raise it if it applies to your house.