A repair price is slippery, because the fault is seldom the whole story. A few slipped tiles at the back of a bungalow can cost less than a tank of fuel. The same number of tiles on the ridge of a three-storey terrace needs scaffold and can cost many times more, even though the roof work is identical. This guide gathers the typical UK figures that outside cost guides publish for tile and slate repairs, flashings and lead, ridges, gutters and small leaks, and then looks at what access adds. None of these are our prices. They are national figures that help you judge whether a quote is in the right area, and where they come from is stated each time. What you actually pay depends on your roof, its height, its covering and what lies underneath, and the only reliable way to know is to have it looked at. We survey for free and set a fixed price in writing afterwards.
The overall range, and what the tiers mean
Averaged across all repair types, MyBuilder's 2026 guide lands between £150 and £1,500. That is a long way from the bottom to the top, and the guide splits it into tiers that are more useful than the average.
| Type of repair | Typical UK range |
|---|---|
| Minor: one drip or a handful of tiles | £100 to £300 |
| Storm damage repairs | £500 to £1,500 |
| Moderate repair | £500 to £1,000 |
| Major repair | £2,500 and above |
The table describes the wider market and is no price list of ours. A fixed quote is written once the survey is done.
The tiers reflect scope more than materials. A minor repair is one defect that can be reached easily and fixed in a visit. A moderate one involves several defects, or one that needs hidden parts replaced, such as a section of battens or underlay. A major one covers a whole slope or a large structural element, such as a section of valley, a chimney rebuild or rotted rafter feet.
The figures are most useful as a sense check. If a quote for three loose tiles comes back at £1,200, ask what else is in it. If one for a damaged valley comes back at £150, ask what is being replaced. Both can be right in unusual cases, but both deserve a line-by-line explanation. A fair quote lists what is being repaired, the materials used, whether scaffold is included and how rubbish is cleared.
Tiles and slates: slipped, cracked and missing
Replacing a handful of tiles or slates is the cheapest kind of roof repair, and it forms most of the minor band above. The labour is short, the material cost is small, and the work is done from a ladder if the roof is low. Typical UK prices for that class of job sit in the £100 to £300 range reported by MyBuilder (2026).
The price rises with each factor that makes the job slower. Height is the first. A slipped tile on a single-storey extension is a quick job. The same tile on a high gable needs a tower or scaffold. Matching is the second. Common concrete tiles are cheap and easy to find, while clay plain tiles, stone tiles and natural slate may need sourcing from a reclaim yard, which takes time and costs more. On a house with a weathered natural slate roof, a new slate in the wrong colour shows for years, so matching stock is worth the extra.
Slate adds its own detail. Because slates are nailed under the course above, a replacement cannot be nailed back in the usual way and is held with a tingle, a little copper or lead strip. That takes more care than lifting and relaying a concrete tile. MyBuilder's slate roof cost guide (2026) gives a slater's day rate of £200 to £300, which helps you judge what a longer slate repair should cost in labour terms.
The third factor is what you find when the tile comes off. Often it is nothing, but a rotted batten, a torn piece of underlay or a damp rafter turns a minor job into a moderate one. A good roofer tells you before the work, not after, and gives the extra as a separate line. Where wind has stripped a whole section, the loss is bigger, and the page on storm damage to roofs picks that up.
Flashings, lead and chimneys
Work around a chimney sits in a higher price bracket than loose tiles, because it involves lead, masonry and usually height. A chimney flashing is lead worked over the roof-to-stack junction, a common spot for water to get in. MyBuilder's chimney repair cost guide (2026) reports a typical UK range of £250 to £1,200 for a flashing repair, and £500 to £2,000 for chimney repair overall. Repointing a stack averages about £750 on the same guide.
MyJobQuote's guide to replacing leadwork on a chimney (September 2026) separates a patch repair, typically £150 to £250, from a full replacement, which averages about £570. The full replacement is £350 to £460 without scaffold and £700 to £920 with it. The spread tells its own story: on a chimney, access can cost as much as the lead.
Why such a wide range for the same item? Because the detail varies. A single-flue stack on a simple roof is less work than a large stack with several pots, or one at the end of a terrace where the lead steps along a wall. Old pointing in poor condition has to be raked out and redone before new lead can be fixed into the joints, and on a Bath stone stack that means lime mortar, a softer mix that suits the stone. Rebuilding a stack is a different order of cost altogether, with a rebuild running past £2,000 and, on the largest stacks, towards £10,000 in MyBuilder's figures, which is why catching a failed flashing early pays for itself.
Lead elsewhere on the roof, in valleys and parapet gutters, is priced by area, detail and access. MyBuilder's flat roof guide (2026) gives lead roofing at £150 to £200 or more per square metre, and a fixed quote is set once we have surveyed it. A long parapet gutter on a terrace is rarely a small job.
Ridge, hip and verge repairs
Ridge and hip repairs are priced by the length of the run and by the method. Both lines are finished with special fittings, a ridge at the apex and a hip at an angled outside corner. Historically those tiles were bedded in mortar, but with BS 5534:2014 in force, a mortar bed cannot be trusted alone, so mechanical fixings go in too. Dry-fix systems, which clip the ridge to a batten and seal it with a ventilated strip, are the alternative. The test specification for them is BS 8612:2018.
Dry ridge, in MyBuilder's 2026 cost guide, comes out at £40 to £60 per metre of ridge, with an average installation of £500 to £1,000 (national figures). The same source does not give a figure for rebedding a ridge in mortar or for a dry verge, and we do not invent one. Instead, expect those to be priced from a measure of the length and a look at the condition of the tiles.
The drivers are length, the number of hips and breaks, the tile profile, and above all access. Ridge work is at the top of the roof, so a ladder is rarely enough and scaffold or a tower is part of the job. On a short ridge, access can be most of the price. That is why a ridge repair often makes sense alongside other work, such as a chimney repair or gutter replacement, when the scaffold is already standing and can be shared.
If the ridge is loose and the tiles below it are sound, repair is usually the better course. If the roof is also failing across its slopes, re-bedding a ridge on top of tired tiles is money tied up in the wrong place. Only a survey shows where your own roof stands on that.
Gutters, fascias and small leaks
Not every leak starts in the roof covering. A defective gutter or fascia lets water into the eaves and down the wall face, and the damp patch inside can look just like a roof leak. They are also among the more predictable jobs to price. In typical UK terms, the 2026 MyBuilder gutter, fascia and soffit guide has guttering at between £30 and £70 per metre, with fascia at £80 to £150 per metre and soffit at £100 to £180 per metre. Fascia and soffit together average about £150 per metre.
Those figures cover replacement. A repair to a gutter, such as re-sealing a joint, re-fixing a sagging run or clearing a choked outlet, costs a fraction of a replacement, and for a single joint is often within the minor repair band above. The cost rises as the run lengthens, as the storeys increase and as the material changes. Cast iron costs more than plastic, to buy and to fit, and on older Bath houses that is often what was originally there.
Small leaks in the roof itself usually sit in the minor band, as MyBuilder's guide describes. What lifts them out of it is the effort of finding the source. A leak that shows at the ceiling can need an hour or two of checking the loft, the flashings and the valleys, and testing, before the cause is clear. Our page on finding a roof leak sets out how that tracing goes and why some leaks take longer than others.
It is worth separating the cost of finding a fault from the cost of fixing it. A roofer who has to open up a roof to trace water is spending time, even if the final repair is one tile. A fixed price in writing, set after the survey, should cover both.
What access adds
Access is the cost that people most often underestimate, because it does not show in the finished work. If a ladder reaches the job, it is straightforward. If a tower or scaffold is needed, the price shifts. On a whole-roof job, MyBuilder's 2026 new roof guide gives scaffold at roughly £1,125. That is for a full job and is not a charge for a small repair, but it shows the scale.
On smaller jobs the effect is just as clear. The chimney numbers above make the point: a simple patch costs roughly £250 on its own, against £550 to £650 once scaffold is added. A leadwork replacement rises between £350 and £460 and between £700 and £920 when scaffold is needed. For gutters, MyBuilder's guide adds £20 to £40 per square metre for scaffold. For roof windows, the same source adds about £500 for access.
Height is the obvious cause, but not the only one. A roof behind a terrace with no rear access, a basement area that stops a scaffold standing in the usual place, a conservatory or lean-to in the way, or a narrow lane all complicate access. Bath's steep streets and tight terraces mean this comes up often, and we look at it during the survey.
There are sometimes ways of limiting it. Bundling several repairs into one visit lets a single scaffold serve them all. Where a roof can safely be worked from a mobile tower, that may cost less than full scaffold. And a small repair low on a roof may need no scaffold at all. A roofer should explain which applies and why. Our page on roof repair without scaffolding explains when that is realistic.
Reading a quote, and what the survey settles
A repair quote should tell you five things. What is being repaired and where. What materials will be used and whether they match the existing roof. Whether scaffold or access equipment is included. What happens to the waste. And what guarantee covers the work. A line that reads only "roof repair, £400" gives you nothing to compare.
The survey is how the unknowns turn into a price. MyBuilder's roof inspection guide (2026) reports £150 to £500 for inspections across the UK, depending on method, and ours is free. We go up, check the covering, flashings, lead and gutters, and take photographs of the roof itself for you to look through. If the fault is in a hidden part, that gets pointed out and shown. The price is then fixed in writing, with the work set out item by item, and a ten-year guarantee on the workmanship is given on paper.
Insurance can change the picture. If the damage was caused by a storm, your policy may pay for some of the work, subject to the terms and excesses, and our page on roof leak insurance explains what insurers tend to look for. We cannot promise a claim will succeed. Keep photographs and the surveyor's report with your records.
Where the roof is listed or in Bath's conservation area, consent may be needed before work that changes its appearance, and B&NES Council is the place to ask. Repairs that match what is there are less likely to raise questions. Our roof repairs service page lists the other repair types we cover. Call 01225 285181 to arrange a survey, or write to us on WhatsApp.