Should you repair your own roof?

Binoculars and a slow walk round the house tell you a good deal. Run your eye along the ridge for any dip or a tile standing proud. Look across each slope for slipped slates, gaps in a course and patches where the colour changes. Check the chimney lead for lifting edges or cracked mortar, and the gutters for sagging, weeds and staining on the wall below.

Indoors, a torch in the loft shows daylight where it should not be, dark marks on the rafters and damp insulation. Photograph anything odd and put the date on the picture. Those images help a roofer, and they help with an insurer too.

Keep off a fragile roof entirely. Asbestos cement sheets, rooflight panels and old felt can give way under a person without warning. Our guide to the signs a roof needs repair lists what to look for.

Clearing a gutter on a bungalow, extension or garage is the one job we would call realistic for a confident homeowner. Use a ladder that stands well above the gutter line on firm level ground, with a stand-off bracket so it does not rest on the plastic. Move the ladder rather than leaning out. Wear gloves, because debris can hide sharp edges.

While you are up there, look at the fixings. Supports are normally set no more than 900 mm apart on Brett Martin's system, so a run that dips between brackets holds a pool and tips it over the front edge. Refit a loose clip if you can reach it without stretching, and note any bracket that has rusted through for the roofer.

Two storeys is another matter. A gutter at that height needs a proper working platform, and a saving on a job priced per metre does not justify a ladder at full extension.

Wet slate is slippery, moss is worse, and a stone or concrete tile can crack under a boot and drop you through. A pitched roof also hides its own edge from the person standing on it. Trades use scaffold, edge protection and roof ladders for exactly this reason, and access is a large part of any repair bill. MyBuilder's 2026 guide puts scaffold at about £1,125 for a full re-roof, and Checkatrade's October 2026 guide gives £700 to £1,300.

That bill is why people reach for a ladder instead. The temptation is understandable, but a fall from a roof is serious in a way no repair invoice is, and walking the slope also breaks the very slates you mean to protect. If a small repair needs access a ladder cannot give, it belongs with a roofer.

Pick a dry, calm day, never one with ice or rain on the rungs. Stand the ladder on firm, level ground, roughly one metre out for every four metres of height, and tie it at the top if it reaches an eaves line. Ask someone to hold the foot. Keep three points of contact, which means two feet and a hand on the ladder, and carry tools in a belt so both hands are free for climbing.

Stop the moment something feels wrong. A cracked gutter bracket, a rung that rocks, a wasp nest under the eaves: each is a reason to come down and call someone. Do not step from a ladder onto the roof covering, and do not carry anything up it that needs two hands.

Replacing slates or tiles means lifting the courses around the fault, checking the fixings and matching the new piece to the old. Lead flashings must be cut and dressed to the surface; a smear of sealant is not a flashing. Chimneys need the stack, flaunching (the mortar cap round the pots) and flashings looked at together, usually from scaffold. Ridge and hip work needs mechanical fixing under BS 5534, not mortar alone. Our guide to roof repair costs shows the published ranges for each job.

Asbestos cement is a special case. The HSE places careful removal of weathered but undamaged asbestos cement in the non-licensed category, though badly broken sheets can make the job notifiable. Neither suits a homeowner with a hammer, and an old garage roof of corrugated sheets should be left alone until someone competent has looked at it.

If water is coming in, deal with the inside first. Move belongings, set a bucket under the drip and stay out from under a ceiling that bulges with water. Switch off the circuit for any room where water reaches a light fitting. Photograph everything.

Do not go up to throw a sheet over the slope. Our answer on whether a tarpaulin can stop a roof leak explains why that is a roofer's job, and our page on leaks that only show in heavy rain helps you describe what you are seeing. When water is coming in we treat it as urgent, and a leaking roof is covered up before it is priced. Ring 01453 933613, message us on WhatsApp or use the enquiry form. For the full picture of our repair work, see roof repairs.