I’m in the attic of the house this week, treating about a zillion beams with wood protection and treatment. This involves wearing a protective mask and goggles, handling noxious chemicals and generally looking silly, but seems preferable to waiting for the roof to fall down.
Funny thing is, the attic of the house is probably the best room in the whole property and it played a large part in why we originally bought it, but is also the least visited. It is used for storing old boxes, a dusty heap of LP records, and about 100 wine glasses and knives to replace those that get broken or lost every week by people renting the property.
The ‘room’ has about 100 square metres of floor area and up to six metres height, and it has the most amazing traditional wooden structure you have seen. It would make an amazing open lounge or a couple of bedrooms but really the house doesn’t need any more bedrooms and we moved across the courtyard into the barn, and we can’t jsutify the expense of a full attic renovation in a gite.
Just up the road from us are two other ‘ensembles’ of buildings that used to be much like ours, but the owner has allowed them to fall down and is apparently adamant that he will never sell them. To you or me this would seem like madness – even a small old barn around here sells for 100k euros, and he could have made a fortune by selling them – but I guess money isn’t everyones priority.
Still, it’s a terrible shame to see the local traditional buildings fall to the floor while a few kilometres away someone else is building brand new houses. Likewise, the common situation here in south-west France where one farmer will rip out an ancient hedgerow (I thought it was forbidden but seems to happen anyway with no great repercussions) while another farmer (or perhaps even the same one) will get a European Grant to plant a row of small trees along the edge of the road.
Anyway, point is, we have seen several houses fall to the ground because the owner won’t sell them – and the collapse of a house always seems to start with the roof. It goes something like this:
- year one, a hole appears in the roof which isn’t repaired
- year 2 or 3 this becomes a large hole in the roof, water and wildlife move into the building
- year 4 walls start to collapse and interior floors fall through
- year 5 onwards the house rapidly completely falls down
You would be amazed how quickly a house can disappear. It’s because the walls are held upright by the weight of the roof, and also the walls are traditionally made of stone held together by clay (with lime render to prevent rain entering). Remove the roof and the walls can fall outwards, and rain can enter the walls and wash away the clay that holds it all together.
Mrs B isn’t keen on this happening to our house, so we are quite meticulous about rooves!
This is also a reason, if you are buying a property in France, to be very wary of houses where all the roof beams have been covered with plasterboard – you have no idea what is behind the plasterboard, and I promise you that around here there are numerous beasties just waiting to munch your house.
If you are buying a property like this, where the wood beams of the roof structure have been covered over, look at the outside of the roof very carefully, from all angles, to check the roof isn’t sagging or out of line at all, and check all interior parts of the wall (the plasterboard) for any sign of damp getting through. Recent repainting is often one of the signs to look out for!
Be VERY WARY where an owner has recently covered all the beams with cheap wood panelling – this is a very quick and cheap way to conceal a problem!!!
If in doubt get an expert to look at it – even if it costs you a lot, it will surely cost less than a replacement roof.
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