Yes, and it almost always should. If you are planning render, windows, pointing or guttering as well, the order you do them in changes what the whole lot costs.
This comes up whenever someone is planning more than one thing on the outside of a house — a re-roof, new render, replacement windows, repointing, new guttering — and the honest answer is that the order matters more than most people expect.
It matters for two separate reasons: protection, and access.
A failing roof is the one defect that damages everything else. Water coming in from above affects plaster, decoration, timber and, over time, the structure. Every other exterior improvement sits below it and is vulnerable while it is unresolved.
There is also a sequencing point that catches people out. Render, pointing and external finishes all meet the roof somewhere — at the eaves, at a verge, at an abutment. If the roof is stripped afterwards, that junction is disturbed and the new finish gets damaged. Doing the roof first means every wall finish can be brought up to a detail that is already correct and will not move.
Roofing is also the trade most exposed to weather. Putting it early gives the programme somewhere to absorb a bad fortnight. Putting it last means one wet spell delays the completion of everything.
This is the larger saving, and it is available purely by sequencing.
Three costs on any job at height are set by the building rather than by the work: scaffolding, site set-up and waste handling. They barely change with the size of the task. So a scaffold erected once and used by four trades costs a fraction of four scaffolds.
A scaffold put up for the roof can also serve:
The principle is simple: everything needing access above ground floor happens in one scaffold period, the roof leads it, and the wall finishes follow rather than precede it.
Do the roof.
It is the item that protects everything else, the one that gets worse fastest if left, and the one whose failure causes consequential damage. Render on a house with a failing roof is money spent on the wrong problem, and it may have to be disturbed later anyway.
There is a second argument that applies particularly to older property. A re-roof is the only moment anyone will see the roof structure. Discovering a soft rafter end or a bowed purlin is far better done before you have spent on the rest of the exterior than after.
While the scaffold is up, these are inexpensive. Separately, each one carries its own access:
| Item | With the roof | On its own later |
|---|---|---|
| Chimney repointing and flaunching | A modest addition | Its own scaffold for a small job |
| Fascias and soffits | Cheap — access already there | Access dominates the cost |
| Guttering | Cheap | Access dominates the cost |
| High-level pointing | Modest | Its own scaffold |
| Upper-floor windows | Access shared | Own access arrangements |
Fascias, soffits and guttering deserve particular mention, because they are the ones most often deferred. They sit lower down where the eye actually lands, so a new roof above tired plastic guttering draws attention to the guttering — and doing them a year later usually costs more in access than the components themselves.
If structural work is needed to the walls — underpinning, rebuilding, or significant movement being addressed — that comes first, because the roof sits on the walls. That is a rare case, and your surveyor or engineer will tell you if it applies.
Two separate systems. Planning: a like-for-like re-roof does not materially affect the external appearance of a building, so under section 55 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 it is not development at all and needs no permission. A visible change of covering can be a different matter, particularly inside a conservation area, where the test is applied more tightly.
Building regulations: where more than 50% of the roof's surface area is renewed, or the work forms part of a major renovation, regulation 23 of the Building Regulations 2010 requires the roof to be brought up to current thermal standards so far as that is technically, functionally and economically feasible — 0.16 W/(m²K) for a roof in an existing dwelling. A patch repair does not trigger it, and neither does a roof over unheated space such as a detached garage.
Talk to us before booking any of them. The sequence is worth more than the individual quotations.
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