Later on in the inspection, the home inspector opens the attic hatch. What does he or she find? The inspector finds the photo below.
What is all the litter? That is the old roof and wood scraps left by the roofers. Can you say unnecessary non-structural material and a possible fire hazard? I see this the most when the previous roof was wood, such as shakes, and the rafters had originally been skip-sheathed. Skip-sheathing leaves gaps below the roof and when the roofing is torn off all the clutter falls through the open holes. It drops into the attic. Any time the roof sheathing above is removed and/or replaced, some of this kind of debris is prone to getting through and into the attic.
This discovery of clutter in the attic disappoints the seller. Obviously, the roofer does not provide a warning or tell the seller that this problem exists. Just the same, it ends up noted on the home inspection report. At that point, some poor soul has to deal with it. The good news is that solving the problem is not usually too hard to do. Somebody has to get in the attic and gather up all that worthless stuff. In so doing that, this lucky person has to avoid stepping through the ceiling.
Steven L. Smith
Bellingham WA Home Inspections
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I can sort of understand the mess when you can't get at it to clean it up because of the skip sheathing. But in your picture they have removed the skip-sheathing (if that is what it had) before installing the new sheathing----a bit unusual for around here.
Charlie,
Yeah, I do not know the specifics on this roof. It is an old photo I have and where it came from is long forgotten. As you say, usually you know they had skip-sheathed because the structure is still visible below the new sheathing.
Sloppy job by the roofer. Im suprised the owner did not take care of this themselves before listing.
Mike,
Sellers never seem to look in attics or crawl spaces. They had no clue at all.
Another point is that I don't know of any roofers that will take on the liability of having his workers walking around on someones ceilings:)
Steve, love the new business logo!
That roofer shouln't have been paid until the litter was cleaned up.
If I showed that house to a buyer and they wrote a contract, our contract requires that a property be conveyed "broom clean and free of debris".
If the owner doesn't have the roofer clean their mess, the owner will do it before closing.