The ridge is the capping that runs the full length of a pitched roof, covering the joint where the two slopes come together. It takes the worst of the wind and has to stay watertight, so when the mortar under it fails the repair is rarely optional for long. The difficulty for anyone pricing the work is that "ridge repair" covers three quite different jobs. Re-bedding lifts the tiles and lays them again on fresh mortar. Repointing leaves the tiles where they are and renews the mortar at their edges. Fitting dry ridge removes the mortar altogether and holds the tiles with a mechanical system. Each is priced differently, and only one of the three has a published per-metre figure we can quote with confidence. This guide gives that figure, explains how the other two are worked out, and shows where access and the survey fit in. The numbers are national ranges from third-party cost guides, so read them as a way to judge a quote, not as a quote.
What decides the price of a ridge job
Four things matter before anyone mentions a rate. The first is length. A short ridge on a small extension is a modest job, while a long main ridge with hips running down to the eaves is several times the work. The second is the tile itself. A half-round or angular ridge tile in a common profile is easy to match and quick to lay. A roll-top or ornamental clay ridge on a Victorian house, or a ridge cut from stone, takes longer to handle and may need to be sourced rather than bought off the shelf.
The third is the method. Mortar bedding, mortar with added fixings and dry ridge each have different materials, different labour and a different life expectancy, which is why the same ridge can be priced three ways. BestBuilders, a single trade guide we treat with caution, gives mortar bedding 15 to 30 years, with cracking from about 15 years on. Marley offers a guarantee of up to 15 years on its dry ridge system, but that is a guarantee rather than a lifespan, and no independent dry-fix life figure is published. We set the methods side by side on our page about dry ridge against mortar.
The fourth is access. A ridge within easy reach of a ladder and roof ladder is cheap to work on. One above a three-storey elevation, a steep slope or a conservatory roof means putting up scaffold or a tower, and getting up there can cost nearly as much as the ridge work.
Beyond these four sit the details that only show on the roof. Some ridges have a hip joining them, and a hip means more cutting and a hip tile or hip iron at the base. Some have a stack or a party wall running through them. Some have tiles that have slipped and cracked and need replacing as well as re-bedding. A fair quote lists these by name rather than folding them into one line.
Dry ridge: the per-metre figure
Dry ridge is the one ridge method with a published national price. MyBuilder's dry ridge installation cost guide (2026) is the source for the figures below, which are national typical ranges.
| Item | Typical UK range |
|---|---|
| Per linear metre of dry ridge | £40 to £60 |
| Whole dry ridge job, typically | £500 to £1,000 |
A linear metre is a metre of ridge line, so a ridge that measures out at ten metres sits near the middle of that installation range at the rates above. The per-metre rate covers the system and the labour to fit it. A dry ridge system replaces the mortar with a ridge batten fixed along the roof, a flexible or rigid ridge roll or seal, and clips or screws that hold each ridge tile down mechanically. The tiles themselves are often reused when they are sound.
What the rate does not usually cover is stripping the old mortar and tiles, any rotten ridge timber found underneath, replacement tiles where some have cracked, and the scaffold. A rate that looks low can leave those out, and a rate that looks high can include them. Ask which.
The same guide notes that installers commonly give a warranty of a minimum of 10 years on a dry ridge. Treat that as the installer's guarantee, not a lifespan. Our own cover is a written workmanship guarantee of 10 years, confirmed alongside the quote.
Mortar re-bedding and repointing: how they are priced
There is no sourced national per-metre figure for mortar re-bedding, so we will not invent one. What can be said is how the price is built, and it is simpler than it sounds.
Re-bedding
Re-bedding is the larger job. The ridge tiles are lifted off, the old mortar is cleaned out, and the tiles are set again on fresh mortar, with the joints finished neatly. Under current practice the new bedding is combined with mechanical fixings, a point we explain in our guide to BS 5534 and ridge fixing. Cost follows the length of ridge, the number of tiles that break on the way off, and the time taken, because the work is done by hand a tile at a time.
Repointing
Repointing is lighter. The tiles stay in place and the failed mortar at their ends and edges is raked out and replaced. It makes sense when the tiles are still firmly bedded and only the surface pointing has cracked or fallen away. Our answer on repointing ridge tiles explains how to tell that from a bedding failure. If the tiles move when pressed, repointing alone will not hold them, and the cheaper job becomes the wrong one.
Because both depend on how many tiles are loose, the price is settled after someone has looked along the ridge. That is also why we advise against a figure given over the phone for a job nobody has seen. Where only a handful of tiles have worked loose and the rest of the ridge is sound, the repair figures in the next section are the better guide. Our answer on loose ridge tiles covers what to do in the meantime.
Access: scaffold, towers and ladders
Access is the cost most often left out of a first estimate. Scaffold for a complete re-roof comes to roughly £1,125 in the new roof cost guide from MyBuilder (2026), though a ridge-only job rarely needs the full scaffold a re-roof does. A single tower or a short run of scaffold at the gable can be enough, and a roof that allows safe working from a ladder and roof ladder needs neither.
Smaller jobs have their own yardstick. In MyBuilder's roof repair cost guide (2026), a minor fix for a small leak or loose tiles runs £100 to £300, and a moderate repair £500 to £1,000. A ridge repair often sits in that bracket when only part of the ridge has failed. The same guide lists storm damage fixes at between £500 and £1,500.
Three things push access up on a Bath-area house. Terraces and tall townhouses put the ridge a long way from the ground. Steep slopes make working from a ladder unsafe. And pavements and basement areas can complicate where scaffold can stand. None of that is visible in a per-metre rate, so we work out access on site and not from a table.
Ask about timing too. Where scaffold has to go up for another reason, such as chimney or gutter work on the same elevation, the ridge can be done at the same time and the access cost is shared. Mention any other work you are considering when you book the survey. Gutter repairs, a leaking chimney flashing or a few slipped slates lower down are all cheaper to deal with in one visit than in three, and the survey notes can then be written to cover them together. It also helps to say whether the loft is used for storage or living space, since a leak at the ridge shows up inside differently in each case, and we would rather know before we go up.
The survey line on a quote
A survey for a ridge job has a narrow purpose: find out how many tiles are loose, whether the bedding has failed along the whole length or in patches, what condition the timber below is in, and which method suits the roof. Independent inspections are priced separately in the national guides. For a stand-alone inspection, MyBuilder's roof inspection cost guide (2026) reports £150 to £500 across all types. Within that, a plain visual inspection is £150 to £250 and drone work £200 to £400, as typical UK ranges.
Our survey costs nothing when we are quoting for the work. We climb up, walk the line of the ridge, raise a tile or two to check the bedding, and take photographs of your roof for you to look through. A fixed price follows in writing, set out line by line.
A good survey line on a quote should cover the following:
- The length of ridge and the number of hips included.
- The method: mortar with fixings, repointing only, or dry ridge.
- Whether the existing tiles are reused and how many replacements are allowed.
- Who removes the old mortar and takes it away.
- The access arrangement and its cost.
- Any ridge timber found to be rotten, and how that would be dealt with.
If a quote lacks these, ask for them. A quote that names the method and the access is one you can compare with another.
Older roofs, lime and listed buildings
The right repair on an older Bath-area house is not always the cheapest. Bath is a World Heritage Site throughout, with about half of the city inside the conservation area. For a listed house, any change to the ridge or its appearance needs consent from the B&NES listed buildings team. Speak to the council first, because work done without consent can be a criminal matter.
The covering also matters. The Bath Preservation Trust took this line on a listed stack at 7 Walcot Buildings: lime pointing, with cement identified as a risk to old stone. The same reasoning applies along a ridge. Lime is softer than cement, moves with the building and lets moisture out, which is why it suits old masonry. It is a different material to a standard sand and cement mix, and the labour is slower, so a lime ridge costs more than a cement one. We cover the mix itself in our guide to lime mortar on ridges.
If the ridge is part of a roof you plan to renew in full, the cost is better folded into that job than repaired twice. Re-roofing rules in England are set out on the Planning Portal, and we explain how they apply on the main ridge, hip and verge repairs service page. Winter does not rule out ridge work, but it affects mortar and scheduling, so our guide to ridge repairs in winter is worth reading before you choose a start date.