Need help: roof leak

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Hey all,

I bought a home a grand total of 3 weeks ago. The house is a tudor-style front, colonial 2-story. And I now have a leak in my foyer.

Now, before reading on, please understand that I recognize I cannot fully convey the angles and positioning involved in this leak. What I will be asking for here is tips on how roof flashing SHOULD be looking/working and where to attack next.


House inspection
Our home inspector was superb: spent 3 hours going over the house with us (did our previous home too).The roof is 15 years old, but is in fantastic shape. He literally said it could be 5 years old, and I believe him after crawling all over it myself.

The faux wood trim to give it the tudor look however is in the initial stages of degradation. Needs a fresh coat of paint, and plenty of areas show that water is being absorbed into the wood trim, drip caps, etc.....they are soft/spongy. Nothing that would indicate a quart of water is wicking into the house though.

The ATTIC itself is bone dry, despite several hard non-stop 10+ hour rains. It covers a good portion of the house and is not a full attic, but can be walked through by stooping over :)

The Leak
Several days ago, after a night of hard rain. I found a drip coming from the ceiling. I immediately cut a 2x2' square of drywall out to track the leak and dry out the area.

Unfortunately, the leak is coming THROUGH 2 2x6 joists that are bound together. Directly above the joist is 2" wide hardwood subflooring. The house is 35 years old.

Above the subflooring is, to the best of my knowledge, an angled roof area and several exterior walls meeting together.

Actions so far

On Sunday, I went up on the roof and inspected everything. Shingles look great. Flashing looked a little bent (as in, water wouldn't immediately roll downhill). I hammered down all nails that were exposed and caulked every seam I could find that was previously caulked or LOOKED like it should've been caulked. I used about 4 tubes of caulk, and that almost entirely on the front of the house. I took my time and ran pretty clean beads too. I caulked expose nail heads too.

Today, it poured again. Leak took awhile to work through all the dried out wood, but appears to be leaking the same amount.


Next steps

I've got some ideas at this point, but i'd like tips from people with greater roofing experience (I've never nailed down a shingle in my life).

1. I can use an angle grinder or an appropriate wood cutting tool to cut out the subfloor. I've never cut subfloor from beneath, so i'd like confirmation that this is an ok route to help try to further track down the leak. The truth is that the leak LOOKS obvious but I can't see beyond that subflooring. It SEEMS impossible based upon the surrounding construction, lack of water signs anywhere else, etc....but if it's OK to cut through subflooring into an area that looks like an attic space, then I think it would be wise to confirm the location of the leak.

2. Take a pry bar up onto the roof and start pulling off the faux tudor-style trim boards on the siding to determine if water is penetrating straight through the wood. If it looks good, re-nail the board and caulk around the edges.

3. The flashing lining the 2nd story where it meets the first in the front of the house is angled weird. Instead of laying flat onto the lower shingles, it's raised up off the shingles about 1/4-1/2". The pitch there is easy to walk on, but it's definitely pitched downwards, so I'd think gravity would take care of it....but perhaps this is the cause.

The flashing is recessed under wood on the wall and on top of shingles on the lower roof. To pull it out, I'm guessing I would need to pop off most of the wall. This seems like an area where a professional might be better....


I'm looking for tips here....there's nothing obvious jumping out at me from the outside. Everything has been caulked....

Thanks all,

Joe
 
Roofing is tricky. It doesn't take much of an opening to get penetration. You really need to show us pictures.
 
Didn't the previous owner disclose the leak? If not they may have to pay to fix it. Talk to your realtor. Of course it's possible it never leaked until now.
 
TallPaul -

Yeah, I took alot of pictures when I cut open the ceiling.

The PO did not disclose a leak in this location. Cutting open the drywall, it appears to have been the original drywall. Or at least, this was not a fresh patch of drywall and the ceiling had not distinct signs of leak damage when we bought it.

That being said, the subflooring directly above the leak shows signs of long-term water absorption. There's warping, splitting, and ringed staining spreading out from the joist on both sides. Whereas the joist itself looks fine, the subfloor is definitely damaged (though it appears to be in fine shape once it dries out fully).
 
Those few who's roof DONT LEAK are the lucky ones. I ve been working on solving a flat roof EPDM issue for years and $10,000- later it still leaks - WORSE! I just got another repair quote and given my generous materials estimates, the labour rates for 3 guys is over $100/hour - each man! This is Highway robbery!
 
ARCO - I had one roof leak before. A company gave me a quote, which I then gave them permission to proceed with. They gave me no notice of when they showed up, left no evidence they had been there, and the roof continued to leak. They sent me an invoice for the work; I called and let them know that the roof leaked and I wasn't even sure if they had been on my roof.

I never paid, and they never called back.

The second roofer took forever, but did a nice job reflashing my entire chimney. Leak stopped.

I want to avoid hiring a roofer, because they know (rightly so) that leaks can be almost impossible to track down and will therefore give outrageous quotes to replace half the roof to:

1. Pad wallets.

2. Ensure their name isn't sullied with a repair that didn't work.

This should be DIY capable, until I get to a point where I need to re-braze/solder flashing at a join.
 
Too many roofers cut corners nowadays. That's why I did my own roof when the time came.

It's very difficult to trace down leaks, especially over the internet. If it's been leaking for a while, follow the trail of rot. The leak may start on the second story roof and travel down the wall. Was your episode in a windy rain, where it comes down sideways?

The roof is 15 years old. The house is 35 years old. Did they replace the flashing? They are supposed to. Many don't.

Otherwise it sounds like the flashing is properly applied. Are there any soft spots on the roof?
 
Maybe there is compensation available from the inspector or previous owner. Maybe this is a water pipe leak, or AC drain leak - it's possible.
Get a pro to do this job, and look for other potential problems.

Sure, you CAN do anything. Don't be offended.
But windshield replacement, tricky roof repairs, and some other stuff warrant a pro.
 
I am certainly not a roofer, but when roof leaks appeared I and friend applied spay on rubberized undercoat around flashing where it joined to chimney, etc. and it very much helped. I am starting to get some leak again but I recently had rotten floor joists in crawl space replaced and they had to jack up the walls to do so, which meant a slight shift in roof possibly causing leaks again. Floor joists are now treated wood and I added a crawl space vent opening dual fan w/t-stat and humidifier switch. Apparently a big problem and I never heard of it before! e-bay by far best price for fan.
 
This leak has now occurred twice (Saturday morning and now this morning) after 6+ hours of continual, steady downpour in non-windy conditions. Everything is just soaked.

It does not happen with A/C or bathroom usage, and the amount of water coming through (and the fact that it decreases when the rain stops) is indicative of rain being the cause.

Honestly, I think the flashing is 15 years old. It doesn't look like something that's been out in the open for 35 PA winters. It looks like well-exposed metal.

I've been over the entire roof in detail. No soft spots. No missing shingles. [censored], the shingles are in great condition and are lying FLAT. No raised shingles indicating a nail underneath is backing out.

It appears that this leak has been there for awhile (i'll show pictures of the subflooring above the leak). It's possible that it just now got to the drywall and soaked through. I examined the drywall I cut out, and it did not appear different/patched, so I doubt the previous owners were hiding it.

I'm interested in the rubberized spray coating....if I cut open this subfloor and can't find the source of the leak, then I'm going to need to start treating exterior spots in a step-by-step fashion and then watching if it leaks to determine where it's coming from. So a rubberized coating that could be sprayed on a region might be a good way to:

1. Treat an area
2. See if it leaks
3. If it does, then move to another area
4. If it stops leaking, then I know the area I sprayed needs to be replaced.
 
Originally Posted By: JoeFromPA
By the way, subfloor looks like this (the subfloor alone appears to have the same construction):

[img:left]http://farm1.static.flickr.com/72/174228353_4d2b3bebfb.jpg?v=0[/img]

There is NO ROOM directly above this....I will confirm with definite measurements, but it appears that directly above this subflooring is an insulated attic space that is non-accessible.

Jeepers a log cabin!? Thats what I have! Is there a chimney anywhere near? Thats the #1 place to look, next are dormers then the ridge venting is just a wide open way in for water.
 
There is a proper way to flash a chimney. Conversely, there are many roofers who don't have a clue on how to make flashing to properly shed water.

One clue that there is a problem with a roof on a potential purchase is to look for gobs of tar and other such sealing material at certain areas. Gobs of tar is definitely a red flag.

With some exceptions, few people aspire to becoming roofers. It's usually a job you end up doing. A smart DIY homeowner who knows what they're doing can often do a superior job.
 
Arco - No, not a log cabin, simply that the sub-flooring above where I cut out drywall ceiling appears to be the same type of construction.

Anyway - Kestas: since a chimney is most likely the most complicated thing to flash properly, I am lucky it's nowhere near the chimney :)

I'm going up on the roof tonight or soon to check and see if a gutter seperated from the roof-line enough to allow water to drip straight down the house.

Edit: But didn't seperate enough to be obvious that it's no longer capturing drainage
 
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