Roof inspection
An inspection earns its cost when it answers a decision you are about to make. In a region where a roof can be slate, composition over slate, or three layers of composition over spaced boards, the most valuable thing an inspection produces is simply knowing what is actually up there.
When it earns its price
Before buying an older house — roof condition is one of the largest numbers hiding in a purchase, and around here a home inspector’s two-line note about the roof rarely distinguishes between slate with thirty years left and slate that is done. When slate is in question — the difference between a repair and a full conversion is enormous, and it deserves someone who works the material rather than someone who sells the alternative. And near the end of a composition covering’s life, when the real question is “this season or in three years” and a documented answer beats a guess in either direction.
What gets checked
On the surface: the covering itself and what it actually is; the valleys and what is sitting in them; step and counter-flashing at every chimney, with attention to whether the counter-flashing is cut into the mortar or sealed to the face; the party-wall junction on attached houses; the porch or low-slope sections and their material; and the eaves, fascia and gutter line where a treed lot does its damage.
In the attic, which matters more here than in newer markets: whether there is any ventilation at all, whether soffit intake was buried by insulation, the condition of the sheathing from below (and whether it is spaced boards), staining or rusted nail tips from condensation, and fans ducted into the attic instead of outside. On a house of this age, the attic is where half the story lives.
What the report is good for
A written report with photographs does three jobs. It turns a purchase negotiation from opinion into evidence — particularly useful when slate is involved and the numbers at stake are large. It converts “sometime soon” into a plan with a season attached, which matters when the trades you need book months ahead. And when replacement is the verdict, it becomes the scope document that makes three bids comparable, because every bidder prices the same documented findings — the same sheathing, the same porch, the same chimney — instead of their own quick look from the driveway.