[Ludi]

It looks like he really does need a new roof.

[Pops]

Light showing through the roof is surely a bad sign.

Either pay someone to patch it and hope for better days or (I'm more convinced now) plan on letting the bank have it back.

There's an old saying about how to make a barn disappear...
Jes' knock a hole in the roof and wait a few years...

...
You're right Ludi, a person needs to either be handy or a well paid specialist, especially when you buy a fixer. it's rough if you're neither.


It might be lonely at the top, but it's a bitch at the bottom
--Jamey Johnson.

[vtsnowedin]

A full pitch roof that is twelve feet high at the ridge? That would make the house about thirty four feet wide. must be some house. Three inch boards set on a five inch spacing. ? Common enough but a corner cut indeed. Light around the chimney flashing and the sewer vent? Happens all the time as houses settle as they dry out after completion over a few heating and snow load seasons. Every house should have these checked and adjusted when they are three to five years old. Beams without flooring in the attic? annoying for sure when your doing an inspection but are you going to stand in the attic when your repairing the roof or are you going to be up on the roof?
Nails through the tar paper? Ever try to drive nails into a board you cant see? Happens to the best of us.
Roofs are all simple. You only have to work on one side at a time. Flashing's and dormers are the hardest part but they too are done one at a time. If twenty feet to the eves is too daunting rent six sets of construction staging to give you sixteen feet by five feet of flat at the level of the eves to work from and slide down to. Take your time setting it up plumb square and level and well tied to the building so you can count on it. Move it around the house as you finish each section. That's what the contractor is going to do if he is not counting on his hired under paid uninsured monkeys to scamper over your roof and make it look good from the ground. No way you will be able to get up there and see what quality of work they have done for the price until a big storm tells you if it is leaking or not.
A bit jaundiced I know but I've been working with contractors for thirty plus years and have seen enough poor work to make you shudder.

[dinopello]

My 100 year old home has galvanized steel (tin) interlocking shingles and they are layed down over 6 or 8 inch planks that have about an 8th of an inch gap. Works great and is very stable. You can see light, but no water gets in. Not sure if this works with asphalt though. Flashing is the key to everything.

[vtsnowedin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dinopello', 'M')y 100 year old home has galvanized steel (tin) interlocking shingles and they are layed down over 6 or 8 inch planks that have about an 8th of an inch gap. Works great and is very stable. You can see light, but no water gets in. Not sure if this works with asphalt though. Flashing is the key to everything.

[Ludi]

If it were me, I would re-do the roof myself. Cost of materials only, saves you a ton of $. Generally, as far as I can figure, you will save at least half of the cost, usually much more. But I guess if a person is too busy making money they might not be able to take the time off to work on their house. Could be done over the course of a few weekends, seems to me.

[Livewire713]

I appreciate everyone's suggestions and I will pass on what you wrote here vtsnowedin. My figures are probably off as Im just guessing what the height in the attic is. As far as the pitch, that is a guess but I can tell you I'm not getting on that roof. He is a friend but Im not killing myself to get up there. Im not real comfortable with heights and it's getting cold here to, which Im not a big fan of the cold either. I personally wouldn't buy a two story house, for one, I don't need all that room and like I said above Im not comfortable with heights. My house is only one level and the roof is really basic, just two sides. I think a lot of first time home buyers don't take into consideration the cost of maintenance.

[Livewire713]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', 'I')f it were me, I would re-do the roof myself. Cost of materials only, saves you a ton of $. Generally, as far as I can figure, you will save at least half of the cost, usually much more. But I guess if a person is too busy making money they might not be able to take the time off to work on their house. Could be done over the course of a few weekends, seems to me.

[Ludi]

I wouldn't do anything on a loan, I would unload my savings rather than take out a loan to repair the house. The only debt I carry is a small ($35,000) mortgage. I operate my business in the black or not at all. I have I suppose an unreasonable paranoia of debt. Can the person not raise the money through unloading savings or borrowing from friends and relatives?

[Ludi]

If they have to go into debt to repair the house, even if they do the work themselves, they should probably default and find a less expensive way to live. Hate to say it, but it sounds like they are not living in a way which is affordable for them.

[vtsnowedin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Livewire713', 'I') appreciate everyone's suggestions and I will pass on what you wrote here vtsnowedin. My figures are probably off as Im just guessing what the height in the attic is. As far as the pitch, that is a guess but I can tell you I'm not getting on that roof. He is a friend but Im not killing myself to get up there. Im not real comfortable with heights and it's getting cold here to, which Im not a big fan of the cold either. I personally wouldn't buy a two story house, for one, I don't need all that room and like I said above Im not comfortable with heights. My house is only one level and the roof is really basic, just two sides. I think a lot of first time home buyers don't take into consideration the cost of maintenance.

[Pops]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Livewire713', 'W')ill the bank loan you the money?

[jdmartin]

Planked roofs were not at all uncommon that long ago. True, most roofers would have laid down a layer of OSB or plywood before popping shingles on this. Best, and probably least expensive full roof he can do at this point is a metal roof over what he's got. Spacers get fastened to the existing roof, and the metal roof goes overtop of that. You get an added advantage of a little bit of insulation, and you don't have to tear off the existing shingle roof. They can also reflash your stack vents and chimney at that time.

If you can see daylight that's a very bad sign. Still might be possible to just flash the existing holes by pulling back some shingles, do it right and renail.

If this guy's got no money, he's pretty much SOL.

[PrestonSturges]

The roof itself is shot when you find your gutters full of rusty roofing nails and shingles in the yard. If you have one or two layers of shingles that are worn out, you can slap down another layer of cheap shingles right over them and nail them down. It's not clear that this is the problem or solution.

[Expatriot]

To be clear, planked subroofing is superior to OSB. OSB is garbage for a lot of reasons - Will weaken very quickly if it gets wet, will flex under weight more than desirable, will not accept nails evenly, which results in over/under driving. Sure, it's "dimensionally stable," but the better question is, how much of an issue is that? The answer - insubstantial for most residential applications.

OSB is used in construction because it is cheaper than plywood and planking. A 4x8 sheet of OSB is about 8 bucks. To do that in planks you'd need about 80% of 32 square feet and 1" thick, or about 25 board feet. Go find that at a price that can compete with 8 bucks a sheet.

OSB is garbage. Avoid it. If you ever build a house/addition to spec, demand plywood for all sheathing and flooring. You increase the price of the structure by a few hundred bucks, and you get a much better product, particularly on flooring.

To put in in perspective, they typically use OSB for subflooring on top of joists now. One layer. Back in the good old days, when shit was built better, they'd use a double layer of plywood layed down at 90 degrees. Talk about a solid subfloor.

The guy with this roof issue sounds like his best bet is defaulting and moving in with his mother.

Hey, if you don't mind Mom's company, living at home is great - declare Chap 7, work under the table and help Mom pay taxes, and never make another student loan payment.

[pedalling_faster]

if i was in his situation, i would put a tarp over it in the winter.

then accept my friends' offers of help and do a slow thorough re-roofing when it's not raining or snowing.

as far as being underwater on the loan - it seems that a lot of people are getting away with stopping paying their mortgage. it takes 12-18 months for the banks to get around to foreclosing.

one option is to choose that route, and to bank that $2000 a month in the form of gold and/or silver.

if/when the bank kicks them out, they rent.