A roof condition report is the written record that comes out of a survey. It lists what was found on each part of the roof, shows it in photographs, and says what should be done about it. Done well, it lets a homeowner, a buyer or a managing agent make a decision without having been on the roof. Done badly, it is a page of jargon with a cost at the bottom.
This guide is about reading the document, not about the survey itself. It follows a report from the front sheet to the recommendations, explains the priority ratings, shows how to check a photograph against its caption, and sets out what a report cannot tell you. If you want to know what a surveyor looks at on the day, start with what a roof survey covers. If you want to recognise typical faults by eye, see roof defects in photos. For the wider service, the hub is roof inspections and surveys.
How a condition report is built, page by page
Reports differ between firms, but a sound one follows the same order as the roof itself. Ours starts with a front sheet and then works from the outside edge inwards, so you can match each heading to a part of the building you can see from the garden.
The front sheet
The first page names the property, the date of the visit, the method used to see the roof (ladder, pole camera, drone or loft access) and the conditions on the day. It also names the covering, whether that is slate, clay, concrete, stone or a flat membrane. That line matters because every later judgement is made against what the material should look like at its age. A slipped slate on a 100-year-old roof tells a different story from a slipped tile on a roof laid a few years ago.
The element-by-element findings
Next come numbered sections, one for each element: main slopes, ridge and hips, verges (the sloping edges along a gable end), valleys (the internal channels where two slopes meet), chimneys and flashings (lead or metal strips sealing each junction), the roofline of fascias, soffits and gutters, and any flat or lean-to roofs. Each section carries a short description of condition, one or more photographs, and a rating.
The limits panel
A good report says what was not seen: a slope hidden behind a taller neighbour, a loft crowded with stored boxes, a flat roof under standing water. Where something was out of sight, it should say so rather than imply it was fine.
The recommendations list
The last section pulls the findings together into an ordered list of work. This is the page most people act on, and the next sections explain how to read it against the ratings and photographs that came before.
Priority ratings: what urgent, soon and monitor mean
Every finding in our reports carries one of three ratings. The wording is plain on purpose, because the point is to help you sort a list, not to impress.
| Rating | What it means | Typical examples |
|---|---|---|
| Urgent | Water is getting in now, or a part could fall or be blown off | A missing slate over a bedroom, a loose ridge tile, a split lead flashing, a blocked valley |
| Soon | Not leaking yet, but the fault will worsen and cost more if left | Cracked pointing at a verge, a slipping run of tiles, worn flaunching round a chimney pot |
| Monitor | Sound for now; look again at the next check | Moss on a north slope, early surface wear, a slightly lifted tail |
Ratings describe consequence, not size
A tiny gap can be urgent and a large area can be a monitor item. A hairline crack in a lead flashing above a ceiling is urgent because water has an easy route. A wide patch of lichen on a south slope is usually a monitor item because lichen is a surface growth and does not by itself let water through.
Ratings are a judgement, and say so
The rating is the surveyor's opinion at one point in time. It is not a test result. If a finding reads "soon" and a storm comes through before you act, ask for it to be looked at again. Leaks and storm damage get dealt with ahead of the rest of the list.
If a finding is rated monitor and you can see a stain on the ceiling below, say so: it may point to a fault the surveyor could not see from outside. A second look from the loft side helps, and our guide to loft inspections covers it.
Reading a photograph against its caption
Photographs are the part of a report that should be hardest to argue with, because they show your own roof rather than a stock image. They are also easy to misread, so it helps to check three things on each one.
Does the picture match the heading?
Every photograph should carry a label saying which slope or element it shows, and ideally a position, such as the left-hand slope as seen from the road. If you cannot work out where on the building a picture was taken, ask. A photograph you cannot place cannot support a recommendation.
Is the fault actually in the frame?
A caption saying a hip tile has slipped should show the gap, the tile edge and the hip line. If the fault is a speck in a wide shot of the slope, a close-up should sit beside it.
Are the angle and light fair?
Low sun across a slope can make an ordinary surface look rough, and a flat grey sky can hide a crack. A sound report will not rely on a single picture for a serious finding. Where a defect is called urgent, expect at least a wide view and a close view, and ideally a second angle.
What photographs cannot show
A photograph shows the top surface. It does not show the underlay, the battens or the rafters below, or whether the nails behind a slate are sound. Those are inferred from other signs: sagging lines, staining in the loft, or slates that lift too easily. Our page on underlay failure signs covers what points to trouble under the covering.
Turning recommendations into a plan
The recommendations list is where a report either earns its fee or fails to. Read the report for three things: what is to be done, where, and with what.
What, where and with what
A useful line reads like a small work instruction. "Re-bed and mechanically fix four ridge tiles at the west end with a dry-fix system" tells a roofer what to price. "Ridge needs attention" does not. Likewise, "replace lead flashing to the chimney front and sides in Code 4 lead" can be priced and checked against the quote that follows, while "flashings poor" cannot. If anything in a quote is vague, ask for it to be made specific before you ask anyone to price it.
Grouping work to save on access
Scaffold is a large item, about £1,125 for a full re-roof on MyBuilder's 2026 guide. Several "soon" items on one elevation can share a single scaffold; ask which findings share a position.
Separating repair from replacement
A good report keeps the two apart. Repair items are individual fixes. A replacement recommendation says why repair no longer makes sense, for instance when so many slates have failed that patching would be chasing faults across the slope. If a report recommends a full re-roof, it should say what it saw that led there, and it should be backed by photographs from more than one place.
Costs sit outside the report
Our condition report records condition and priorities. It does not carry a price. Pricing follows in a written quote covering access, stripping, new materials, labour and clearing. Keeping them apart means the findings are not written to fit a number.
Reading a report on a stone, slate or older roof
Older roofs need a slightly different reading, because a defect that would be serious on a modern tiled roof can be ordinary wear on an old one, and the reverse.
Stone slate and diminishing courses
On a Cotswold stone roof the slates run from long at the eaves to short at the ridge, in diminishing courses, so a report should describe the slope by band rather than by a single measurement. It should also say whether the fixings are oak pegs. Cotswold District Council's 2000 guidance records that a roof stripped for repair often has a large share of its slates perished; if your report mentions delamination (the layers of the stone flaking apart) it is worth asking how widespread it is. Our guide to diminishing courses explains how those bands are set out.
Natural slate
On slate the report may mention corroded fixings letting slates creep downwards, seen from outside as a slate sitting lower than its neighbours. Ask whether the surveyor lifted any slates to check the nails, or inferred the problem from the line of the courses.
Listed and conservation area buildings
A listed building or a home in a conservation area should be flagged in the report, because that changes what consent may be needed. Building Regulations notification is something we take on when the job calls for it. For the character of the building, check with Stroud District Council's planning team.
Age and what the report can say about it
Lifespans are ranges, not promises. MyBuilder's slate guide, updated August 2026, gives natural slate as 80 to 100 years or more, while concrete tiles run at 30 to 50 years on the same site's figures. A report that quotes a remaining life for a roof is giving an opinion, and should say it depends on exposure, workmanship and maintenance.
Using the report: buyers, landlords and claims
The same document gets used in different ways, and each reader should look at it slightly differently.
If you are buying
Read the urgent and soon items first and ask whether any of them were visible at the viewing. A condition report gives you evidence to ask for work to be done, to negotiate, or to price the repairs before exchange. If a homebuyer survey has already flagged the roof, our guide to the homebuyer roof follow-up sets out the sensible next steps.
If you manage rented property
A condition report is the baseline for a programme: one report per building, ratings carried forward, and a record of what was done after each visit. Our guide for landlords and letting agents covers how that works over several properties.
If there has been damage
A report written after a storm or a fall of masonry has a second job: it records what was found and when. That record is what an insurer will ask to see, and insurance roof inspections explains what to put in it. Your policy, not the report, decides what is covered, so read your policy and speak to your insurer.
Keep the report with the house papers. When the next survey is done, the two documents together show which faults are new and which have simply been waiting.
Questions to put to the surveyor before you act
Once you have read the report, a few questions will tell you how much weight to put on it.
- Which findings did you see up close, and which did you infer from a distance?
- Which slopes or areas could you not see, and what would you need to see them?
- Did you go into the loft, and if so what did you find on the underside of the roof?
- Which of the recommended works must be done together, and which can stand alone?
- What would you expect to find if the covering were lifted, and how would that change the work?
A clear answer names a part and a position. If the surveyor cannot say how they know something, treat that finding as provisional.
When to ask for a second visit
If the report leaves a serious question open, such as whether a stain in the loft comes from the roof or from a condensation problem, a second visit with a different method is better than guessing. Our comparison of inspection methods shows which method suits which question. Whatever is found, the next step is a written quote, and any work we carry out comes with our written 10-year workmanship guarantee.
To have a report prepared, send the address and any earlier survey, and we will tell you which part of the roof we would check first. Ring 01453 933613, use WhatsApp or the form.