When I was a kid about 10 years old, I loved to climb trees, much to the worriment of my mom. I even built a tree house for some friends and me in the back yard...but that's a story for another time.
Recently I have begun to call on those old climbing skills as I inspect attics. Where the construction and roof truss braces allow, I climb up to the top of the attic to get a close look at a frequent source of problems, the ridge vent.
Ridge vents are an essential part of a modern roofing system. They allow hot air to escape at the top of the roof and this creates a slightly lower pressure in the attic that draws air in through the soffet vents at the lower end of the roof. This cooler air travels up the underside of the roof to the ridge vent, cooling the roof and prolonging its life.
The ventilation provided by a properly installed ridge vent, paired with properly installed soffet vents, also reduces humidity and moisture condensation in the attic and the opportunity for mold to take hold. In the worse case scenerio, bad attic ventilation can lead to expensive problems to fix. How can this happen?
Sometimes things just happen in house construction. Mistakes are made for innocent reasons. Take for example, crew that is putting down tar paper ahead of the roof shinglers. Lets say there are storm clouds approaching and its near the end of the day. The crew may tar paper right over the ridge vent hole at the top of the roof so that rain will not come in through the hole.
The next day, a different shingling crew finishes the shingling and not seeing a ridge vent hole, shingles right over the top. Later the supervisor notices there is no ridge vent and orders the crew boss to "put one on". An inexperienced crew hand tacks one on, on top of the shingles and nobody notices while he is making the mistake.
Later, looking up through the attic access hole at the ridge vent hole 15 feet above, supervisors, buyers, county inspectors, home inspectors, and lots of others look up to see the black strip they expect for a ridge vent and don't bother to look closely at it.
Can you see the underside of the asphalt shingle? This is close up. At 15 feet away it is really hard to see.
Years later, along comes yours truly who loves climbing trees. I get up close enough to tap the underside of the shingles or tar paper (I've found cases where the shingles were put over the hole after the tar paper was cut out...that was not because of an approaching storm!).
The problem with me finding this "bad toupee" years later is that the lack of a properly installed ridge vent has caused the previous home owner to deal with a very hot attic. In one case, there were multiple ceiling fans installed in the bedrooms of the upper floor. In another, the attic fan installed may not have been necessary. In all cases, the energy costs were elevated because of the condition.
I am sure that my insurance company wouldn't like my love of climbing trees but neither did my mother. It was her constant nagging me about it that both spurred me on and made me extra careful. I bragged too many times that I had never fallen, would never fall, to face her if I ever did. Which I didn't. Thank goodness!! Whew!
It's a good idea to have me climb around in your client's prospective home. You never know what you will find.
Sincerely,
Home Status Inspection Company
Copyright March 12, 2008 All Rights Reserved.
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