Do this first
What to do right now
- Stay off the roof. Tile cracks under body weight, and half the broken tiles roofers find were broken by someone walking on them.
- Photograph the roof from the ground at maximum zoom and note which slope and roughly which course the damage is on.
- Collect any tile fragments from the ground, a physical sample is the fastest way to identify the profile and manufacturer.
- Check the attic for daylight, damp sheathing or water staining directly upslope of the interior stain.
- If tiles are missing and rain is forecast in Sacramento, get temporary cover over the exposed underlayment first.
- Ask any roofer you call whether they carry or can source matching tile before booking, profile matching is the hard part.
Tile roof service life and the lift-and-relay option
- Tile service life
- Clay and concrete tile routinely lasts 50 years or more.
- Underlayment service life
- On an older Southern California home, often only 20 to 30 years. The underlayment, not the tile, is the layer that keeps water out.
- Lift and relay
- The existing tile is carefully removed and stacked, the underlayment and battens are replaced, and the original tile goes back down. It costs far less than new tile.
- Leading cause of broken tile
- Foot traffic, by a distance: satellite installers, solar crews, painters, HVAC technicians and pest control.
- Matching a discontinued profile
- Tiles are pulled from an inconspicuous slope to patch the visible area, and the borrowed area is filled with the closest available substitute.
- Maximum down payment
- $1,000 or 10% of the contract price, whichever is less.
The tile is not the waterproofing
This is the single most useful thing a homeowner in Sacramento can understand about their roof. Clay and concrete tile shed the bulk of the water and protect what is underneath from UV, but the layer that actually keeps water out of your house is the underlayment, traditionally felt, now more often a synthetic or SBS-modified membrane. Tile routinely lasts 50 years or more. Underlayment on an older Southern California home may only last 20 to 30. That is why so many tile roofs here need a "lift and relay": the existing tile is carefully removed and stacked, the underlayment and battens are replaced, and the original tile goes back down. It costs far less than new tile and it is the repair most homeowners are not told about.
Why individual tiles break
Foot traffic is the leading cause by a distance, satellite installers, solar crews, painters, HVAC technicians and pest control all walk tile roofs, often badly. After that: falling limbs, thermal cycling on older concrete tile, and slipped tiles where the fastener or the nose lug has failed. A single cracked tile is not an emergency, but it exposes underlayment to direct sun and to standing water at the crack, and that is how a $30 problem becomes a ceiling repair two winters later.
Matching a discontinued profile
Many Sacramento homes carry tile profiles that have been out of production for decades. Good tile roofers keep salvage stock and know the regional yards that do. The standard trick when nothing matches exactly is to pull tiles from an inconspicuous slope, a rear elevation or behind a chimney, to patch the visible area, then fill the borrowed area with the closest available substitute. Ask about this before you accept an answer of "we would have to redo the whole roof".
Whoever you hire, confirm the C-39 licence at cslb.ca.gov, and remember that California caps the down payment on a home improvement contract at $1,000 or 10% of the contract price, whichever is less.
