What Bay Area roof reports flag, and what it costs to act on it
We read the roofing findings in Bay Area home inspection reports: how often they come up, which items they are, and what the estimates add up to per home.
Each dot is one of the 12 Bay Area homes with a roofing estimate, placed by its roofing total; the band is the middle half, the line the median ($2,248).
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Somewhere in a Bay Area inspection report is a page about the roof, the flashing around it and the gutters below it.
This article reads the roofing findings in 22 Bay Area home inspection reports. Every finding comes from the inspection report, and the dollar figures are Insite’s estimates for them. Insite files each finding under a category, and Roofing holds what the inspector wrote about the roof covering, the flashing, and debris or moss on the roof; gutters are often filed under Exterior, and the bars below count them wherever they are filed. A home counts here when its report has at least one cost-bearing roofing finding: 12 of 22 (55%).
One note on the numbers that follow. Every issue share is out of all 22 reports, not out of the 12 with a roofing finding, so an issue flagged in 8 reports reads as 36%.
Each home’s roofing figure is the sum of its priced roofing findings, at the midpoint of Insite’s range for each. All 12 affected homes have at least one roofing estimate, and the median is $2,248.
The range per home
A median hides the spread, so the next chart shows every affected home. The middle half fall between $895 and $3,099; the band marks them and the line marks the median.
Each dot is one home’s total roofing estimate (the midpoint of Insite’s range for each priced roofing finding).
The lowest roofing total is $344. The highest, $7,456, is about 3 times the median, which is why we quote the median and the middle half rather than an average. Four of 12 homes come in under $1,000, and two above twice the median.
A total is a sum of items, so a high one can be a single large item or several smaller ones. The roofing page of the report shows which.
Which roofing items come up
The chart counts the reports that flag each roofing issue at least once, whatever category the finding is filed under. A report can flag several, so the bars add up to more than 100%.
Gutters or downspouts and wear on the roof covering lead together, each in 8 of 22 reports (36%). Flashing and debris or moss on the roof follow with 6 each. No roofing issue appears in more than half the reports.
The bars are the issues Insite can name from a finding’s title. A roofing finding that matches none of them still counts toward the 12 homes above but not toward any bar, and a named item filed under another category counts toward its bar but not the 12.
Gutters or the covering
Gutters and covering wear are flagged in the same number of reports, 8 of 22. The typical estimate for covering wear is $709, against $289 for gutters.
Typical is the median estimate for one finding of that kind, across the reports that flag it.
Flashing is typically $390 a finding, and debris or moss on the roof $692. No named roofing item has a typical estimate as high as the median roofing total of $2,248, so a total near the median takes more than one typical item.
By region
Two regions have at least two homes with a roofing estimate: South Bay and Peninsula. The callout shows each region’s median roofing estimate.
South Bay’s median, $2,657 across 8 homes, is the higher of the two; Peninsula’s is $599 across 4.
Age, size and price
We split the 22 reports by when the house was built, by its size and by its price, one at a time. The price is the asking price, or the sale price for the 2 homes where only that was published. A band is shown only when it holds at least three homes, and a home missing a fact is left out of that split.
More than half the homes in each age band have a roofing finding: 4 of the 5 homes built before 1960, 5 of the 8 built 1960–1979 and 3 of the 5 built 1980 or later.
Each band counts only its homes with a roofing finding; the median is over the affected homes in each band with a roofing estimate.
The medians by band fall as the houses get newer: the median roofing estimate runs from $3,100 (Built before 1960) to $1,800 (Built 1980 or later).
The share with a roofing finding falls as the size grows: from 4 of the 5 homes under 1,500 sq ft to 4 of the 9 over 2,500 sq ft.
Each band counts only its homes with a roofing finding; the median is over the affected homes in each band with a roofing estimate. $4M and up is not shown: it has fewer than two affected homes with a roofing estimate.
The medians by band fall as the price rises: the median roofing estimate runs from $5,200 (Under $2M) to $600 ($3M–$4M).
Each count is out of the homes in that age band, not out of all 22 reports.
Covering wear turns up most in the houses built before 1960: 4 of the 5 homes built before 1960, against 2 of the 8 built 1960–1979 and 2 of the 5 built 1980 or later.
Treat gaps between bands as rough. Each band holds a handful of homes, between 4 and 9; prices follow region, and most of a region’s reports come from one inspection firm.
Three things to do with your own report
If your report has roofing findings, start here.
- Check whether each roofing item is the covering, the flashing or the gutters. Here gutters and covering wear are each in 36% of reports, with typical estimates of $289 and $709.
- Ask for the inspector’s photos or pages behind each wear item, so you can see what the note describes. Covering wear is in 8 of 22 reports here.
- Ask whether a roofer has written up the roof, separately from the home inspection. The findings here come from inspection reports; the dollar figures are Insite’s estimates.
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