Roof inspection guide
How much does a roof inspection cost?
A roof inspection is priced by the work behind it: how many slopes, how high the eaves, how we get a clear view and what lands in your hands at the end.
Search for the price of a roof inspection and you meet a scatter of figures, plus offers of a free look that may or may not come with anything in writing. The spread is not a trick. Two houses on the same street can need very different amounts of time and equipment to check, and a figure that ignores that tells you little.
This guide sets out what an inspection fee is paying for, the one national average that can be tied to a source and a date, the points on your own house that push the price up or down, and the questions worth asking before you agree to anything. It also sets the fee beside the jobs an inspection leads to, because the sensible way to judge a modest fee is against the larger decision it informs.
We name no price of our own on this page. Where we quote for work, you get a single written total after the roof has been seen.
01Key points
What an inspection fee pays for
A fee covers three things: time, access and a written result. The time goes on reading each slope, the ridge, the hips, the valleys, the metalwork round chimneys and roof windows, and the gutters at close range. Then comes the underside of the roof from inside, wherever there is a hatch. Access means a ladder, or a drone flight where a ladder would stop at the gutter. The written result is the part you keep.
A fee for a full inspection should buy:
- a visit to every slope, not only the one above the stain on your ceiling
- a look in the loft for daylight, tide marks, damp timber and the state of the underlay (the membrane beneath the battens, which is the second line of defence when a tile lets water past)
- photographs of each fault, with its place on the roof marked
- a plain verdict on each one: repair, replace or keep watching
Cheaper checks exist, and some are worth having. A roofer who walks round the house, looks up and tells you what can be seen from the pavement is giving you a view from the ground. That can pick out missing tiles. It cannot show a soft batten or a torn underlay, and a price that leaves those out is a price for a smaller job. Before comparing two figures, ask which job each one covers.
It also helps to know who will be on your roof, and what they are expected to look at, before you agree a date. A call to ask what the visit includes settles most of what could otherwise be argued about afterwards.
02The detail
The one dated national figure
MyJobQuote's survey page, updated in October 2026, gives around £300 as the average price of having a roof surveyed. That is the single inspection figure this guide can tie to a source and a date, and it is a national average. It is not a Folkestone price, not a Fairview price and not a forecast for your house.
Averages hide the spread. A bungalow with one hip and a gable end, reached by ladder from the garden, sits at one end of any such number. A three-storey terrace with a roof over a rear extension sits at the other, because the camera has further to travel and the access takes longer to arrange. Neither house is being overcharged or undercharged. The work differs.
Roof inspection price questions
Why are two inspection prices for one house far apart?
The two quotes may well cover different jobs. One may include the loft, a photographed report and a drone flight over the high slopes, while another covers a walk round the outside and a spoken verdict. Put the questions above to both firms and the gap tends to narrow to what each is really doing.
The page gives a single number rather than a range, and it does not say how many slopes, how much height or what kind of report sits behind it. Treat it as a marker for the sort of sum involved, never as a figure to hold a firm to. A quote far above it is worth a question about why, and one far below it invites the same doubt about what is missing from the job.
When anyone quotes you for an inspection, ask whether VAT is in the price, as you would for any building job. A figure with no basis stated cannot be compared with one that has. A free look can be a perfectly good first visit, and our page on roof inspections explains what each visit covers. What matters is knowing whether a report follows, because the report is what makes an inspection useful later, to you and to anyone you show it to.
03Price
What moves the price on your house
Time on site and the kit needed to see properly are what change the fee from one house to the next. The table sets out the main points, none of which needs a measuring tape to spot from the garden.
| On your house | What it changes |
|---|---|
| Number of slopes and roof shape | More hips, valleys and dormers mean more edges to read |
| Height of the eaves | A tall house may need a longer ladder or a drone |
| A clear way into the loft | A boarded loft or blocked hatch limits the view of the timber |
| Chimneys and roof windows | Each has flashings to read at close range |
| A flat roof, garage or outbuilding | Different coverings, each judged on its own terms |
| The report you ask for | A photographed, written report takes longer than a spoken verdict |
Some of these points you can change before the visit and some you cannot. Clearing the loft hatch, moving a wardrobe from beneath it and telling the firm about any flat roof or garage at the back all cut the time, and the fee tends to follow the time.
Where the roof stands too high to read from a ladder, our guide to inspecting a roof without scaffolding lays out the options. Scaffold put up simply to look is paid for like any other scaffold, and a camera flown along the slopes costs a different amount for a different reason. Whichever method is used, the report should say what was seen close up and what was only seen from a distance.
04In brief
Writing it down, and when it pays
For pricing, the useful split is between a verbal opinion and a written one. A verbal opinion costs little and cannot be shown to anyone. A written report with photographs can go to a seller, a landlord, a managing agent or a second roofer asked for another price, and it reads the same a year later. Our guide to the roof condition report shows what a finished one contains.
Is the fee the same as the cost of repairs it finds?
No. The fee pays for the looking and the report. Any repair is a separate job, priced after the survey and written as one total. Ask the firm how it treats the two, because some take the inspection fee off later work and some do not, and you want that settled before you pay.
These are the moments when a written inspection earns its fee:
- before exchange on a house, when a buyer's survey has flagged the roof or only saw it from the ground
- after a storm, because photos of the damage and any expert report carry weight with the Financial Ombudsman Service, which says it will usually look at both
- before letting a property, as a dated record for a landlord
- on an older roof nobody has looked at for years
- when a re-roof quote seems larger than the faults you can see
The last is the most useful. A written inspection from a second roofer is the least costly way to test whether a large quote fits the roof. If the report and the quote agree, you go ahead knowing why. If they do not, you found out before spending the bigger sum. After a storm the order of events matters, and our page on a roof inspection after a storm says what to photograph before anything is moved.
05Side by side
The fee beside the jobs it informs
An inspection fee looks different beside the work it steers you towards. These are third-party ranges for typical UK jobs, with the source and date of each. They are not Fairview prices and not a quote for your roof.
Which? says South East jobs, Kent and East Sussex included, are likely to sit at the upper end of its ranges.
The figures exclude VAT and come from a survey of eleven Which? Trusted Traders, so they describe what such traders reported, not what any one firm will charge. They give a sense of scale, nothing more, and they say nothing about access, scaffold or a particular covering.
Read the table as a spread of outcomes. An inspection that finds one loose ridge tile sends you to the second row. One that finds the whole covering worn out sends you to the third. The fee is small beside the gap between them, and the report is what tells you which row your roof belongs in. It is also why a report that merely says "needs work" is worth little: you cannot place a roof in the table from those words.
| Job | Published figure | Source |
|---|---|---|
| One to six broken or missing tiles replaced | £75 to £400, excluding VAT | Which? Trusted Traders, November 2025 |
| A new ridge tile | £80 to £300, excluding VAT | Which? Trusted Traders, November 2025 |
| Whole roof of an average three-bedroom house | £7,000 to £21,000, excluding VAT | Which? Trusted Traders, November 2025 |
06In order
Questions to ask before you pay
These questions turn a vague quote into one you can compare. Put them to any firm, including us.
The last question is about how a firm works, so ask it plainly. At Fairview, work that follows an inspection comes as a single written price after the survey. When you compare written prices, check that each states whether VAT and scaffold are included, since a total that leaves either out is not like for like.
One more check applies if you sign at your own front door after a survey. A contract made in your home carries a 14-day cancellation period, and work begins earlier only if you ask for that in writing. A repair visit you specifically request as urgent sits outside that right. The Citizens Advice consumer helpline, 0808 223 1133, can explain where a particular case falls, and it is a sensible number to keep to hand before any contract is signed.
- Which parts of the roof does the price cover: every slope, the loft, the chimney, any flat roof or garage?
- Will I get a written report, and will it carry photographs?
- How will the high parts be reached, by ladder, drone or scaffold, and who pays if scaffold is needed?
- Does the price include VAT?
- If the report finds a repair, how is that work priced afterwards, and is the fee taken off it?
- Who will be on the roof, and when do the photographs reach me?
Does a full loft change what an inspection costs?
It can. A loft packed with boxes or boarded across the joists hides the timber and the underlay, so the check takes longer or leaves gaps the report must name. Clearing a path to the hatch and along the eaves before the visit lets the loft check go further.
Tell us what's wrong with the roof.
You'll get one written total price.