01903 299063 Get a quote

Roofers in Southbourne

Southbourne sits on the coastal plain at the head of Chichester Harbour's Thorney Channel. Its roofs run from early 19th-century flint-faced brick at Hermitage to peg tiles at Prinsted and a Victorian church.

Get a quoteCall 01903 299063

Three Southbourne roof settings and their trouble spots

  • Terraced roofs of different ages

    Mixed-age streets at Hermitage

    The Hermitage character appraisal describes incremental growth over the last 120 years, so one street can hold roofs of several ages.

    Read more about Mixed-age streets at Hermitage

    Each is surveyed on its own evidence, never on what the neighbours' roofs showed.

  • Lead flashing against a flint wall

    Flint-faced brick at Watersedge

    Watersedge in Lumley Road is an early 19th-century house of brick faced with flints, listed Grade II. Wherever a roof meets flint, the lead flashing has to sit tight in the joint, and that seal gets tested first.

  • Handmade clay peg tiles

    Peg tiles and thatch at Prinsted

    Handmade clay peg tiles and thatch cover the Prinsted roofs that the conservation area appraisal describes, above flint, stone and brick walls.

    Read more about Peg tiles and thatch at Prinsted

    When peg tiles are repaired, size, colour and surface texture all need to echo the roof around them.

Street map of Southbourne, west of central Worthing, with a pin on the town.

Local authority records,

Planning authority
Chichester District Council
Councils
Chichester District Council and West Sussex County Council
Conservation area
Prinsted Conservation Area lies in the parish; Southbourne village itself is not within one
Landscape
The village sits within Chichester Harbour National Landscape, a nationally designated protected landscape
Listed examples
Watersedge, Lumley Road, and Slipper House, Slipper Road, both Grade II
From central Worthing
28.2 road miles, west, about 42 minutes by car

Southbourne roofs

From Hermitage flint to Prinsted peg tiles

Three roof matters that grow out of how this harbour-head parish was built.

Chapter one

Flint-faced brick and mixed-age roofs at Hermitage

Hermitage grew in stages, so neighbouring houses can carry roofs of very different ages and conditions.

The Hermitage character appraisal, written for the parish neighbourhood plan in September 2022, says the area's character zones reflect incremental growth over the last 120 years. For a roofer that is a practical warning. Two houses side by side may have been built a generation apart, with different tiles, different timbers and different ideas about ventilation, so nothing about one roof can be assumed for the next. Our survey looks at each roof for its own age and condition, from the covering and the battens, the slim timber laths it hangs from, to the underlay beneath and every lead-lined junction. A look inside the loft helps too, since timbers and underlay carry a record of past leaks that the tiles on top conceal. Older roofs here will often have been mended more than once, and part of the survey is telling original work from later patches.

At a glance

  • Hermitage grew in stages over about 120 years
  • Watersedge, Lumley Road, is Grade II and flint-faced
  • Slipper House, Slipper Road, is also Grade II
New lead valley between two slate roof slopes
New lead valley between two slate roof slopes

1.1 Where flint meets the roof

Watersedge, in Lumley Road, is an early 19th-century house of brick faced with flints, and it is one of the listed buildings the appraisal names. Flint walls matter to a roofer because every roof ends at a wall, and the join is sealed by flashing, a band of lead worked over the junction. Flint presents a rough, bumpy face, so a flashing that has pulled from its joint, or split where the lead has moved, lets water trickle down inside the masonry. The damp then appears indoors well away from the fault, so the leak is chased to its start before any price is given. Leadworx calls Code 4 the standard choice for general flashing, and MyJobQuote says lead flashing can last over 80 years, so a flashing that fails early points to movement or poor fixing. Our lead roofing page covers the detail.

New lead valley between two slate roof slopes
New lead valley between two slate roof slopes

1.2 Listed neighbours and consent

Slipper House, in Slipper Road, is also Grade II. Works that alter a listed building's character need listed building consent from the council, and a repair made in a different material can count as one of them. Chichester District Council's planning team is the one to ask, and the answer should be in hand before a scaffold goes up. Not sure about your own house? The council's records show its listing status, and the enquiry costs nothing. On an unlisted house nearby the question is simpler: what is failing, how far does it extend, and what is the smallest repair that settles it.

Lead flashing facts for a flint-faced wall

Standard flashing code
Code 4, 1.80 mm thick (Leadworx)
Soakers
Code 3 is recommended for soakers only (Leadworx)
Flashing lifespan
Over 80 years, over 100 for higher codes (MyJobQuote)
Patch repair, typical UK range
£150 to £250 (MyJobQuote)

Source: Leadworx; MyJobQuote leadwork guide, 22/09/26, fetched October 2026

Chapter two

Prinsted's peg tiles and thatch by the harbour

Prinsted's appraisal describes thatch and handmade clay peg tiles above walls of flint, stone and brick.

Stacks of new handmade clay plain tiles on scaffold boards
Stacks of new handmade clay plain tiles on scaffold boards

Within the parish, the one conservation area is Prinsted, a small harbourside settlement. Chichester District Council's 2012 appraisal describes roofs of thatch or handmade clay peg tiles, with walls of flint, stone and brick. Southbourne village itself is not in a conservation area. Peg tiles take their name from the timber pegs once used to hang them from the battens, and a modern repair still has to respect what the tile is: handmade, slightly uneven, with a surface that weathers unevenly too. Those qualities are why a few shiny machine-made tiles dropped into an old roof look wrong for years afterwards.

At a glance

  • Prinsted is the parish's conservation area
  • Its roofs are thatched or clay peg-tiled
  • Southbourne village itself sits outside a conservation area
Lead-lined valley where two clay-tiled roof slopes meet
Lead-lined valley where two clay-tiled roof slopes meet

2.1 Matching tiles on a Prinsted roof

Where a handful of tiles have slipped or cracked, our first move is to see whether sound tiles can be lifted from a less visible slope and reused on the face that shows. New handmade clay tiles then make up the shortfall, chosen against the old ones in daylight, not from a catalogue picture. Nails, battens and the lap between courses are tested as the tiles come off, because a slipped tile is often the symptom of a fixing that has rusted through. Age alone is no reason to strip a roof that is still sound. Our pitched roofing page describes the options for a pitched roof, from a patch to a full re-cover.

Lead-lined valley where two clay-tiled roof slopes meet
Lead-lined valley where two clay-tiled roof slopes meet

2.2 Thatch next door, and the harbour designation

Approved Document J gives thatch its own, wider flue clearances, so a chimney beside a thatched roof is a job to plan, not to improvise. If a stack stands close to thatch, we want the flue height and clearance settled on paper before anyone repairs the stack itself. Southbourne also falls within Chichester Harbour National Landscape, which is the kind of designation that makes any change of appearance worth checking first. Putting back the same covering is the usual starting point, and our roof planning permission guide sets out where that stops. Chichester District Council's planning team can confirm whether any Article 4 direction touches your street, and its reply is worth keeping with your papers.

What people saySouthbourne is a conservation area, so tile repairs here always need permission.

What is trueOnly Prinsted, within the parish, has that status, and even there, renewing a roof in the identical material is treated differently from switching to another.

Chapter three

Harbour-head weather, salt and the 1876 church

Southbourne's coastal plain and its Victorian church show how roofs and rooflines age with salt air and weather.

The church of St John the Evangelist was built in 1876 to designs by T. Chatfield Clark, and the ecclesiastical parish of Southbourne was formed in 1878 out of the southern part of Westbourne. St John's is an Anglican church. Where such a church is listed and still holds services, the Church's own faculty process takes the place of council listed building consent, which makes the parish office the first call. The civil parish came later, in 1967, and takes in Nutbourne. A roofer reads that history as a spread of dates: Victorian, interwar, post-war and modern houses, all within a few miles of tidal water, each with its own weak points.

At a glance

  • St John the Evangelist was built in 1876
  • Salt gathers where rain cannot rinse the roofline
  • MyBuilder puts fascia and soffit life at 10 to 20 years
New single-ply membrane flat roof with a welded upstand and edge trim near the sea
New single-ply membrane flat roof with a welded upstand and edge trim near the sea

3.1 Salt on the roofline

HomeBuilding explains that marine air carries salt, and that boards tucked under the eaves never get rained on, so deposits stay where they land. That makes the roofline, not the tiles, the part of a house near the harbour that often needs attention first. Washing with clean water from time to time takes the salt off, and when boards are replaced the detail at the gutter line is worth getting right. Gutter makers recommend a slight slope towards the outlet, between about 1:600 and 1:350 depending on the system, with Brett Martin asking for supports no further apart than 900 mm. A run that sags between its brackets holds water, spills over the fascia and rots the board behind it.

New single-ply membrane flat roof with a welded upstand and edge trim near the sea
New single-ply membrane flat roof with a welded upstand and edge trim near the sea

3.2 Cleaning without harm

Moss and algae gather on any roof near wet ground, and MyBuilder cautions that high-pressure jets may harm fragile tiles, and prices gentle manual scraping at £5 to £10 per m². On a handmade peg-tile roof we favour the gentle route, and we look at the surface afterwards for tiles the moss was holding together. Our gutters, soffits and fascias page explains each part of the roofline.

3.3 Pricing the roofline

Access drives most of the cost, followed by length, material and the state of the timber behind the boards. MyBuilder reports these as typical UK figures, and your own number follows the survey. When the work is done we haul the waste off site. If the boards behind a gutter have rotted, the survey photographs show it before any quote, so the cost of replacing them is not a surprise on the day.

Typical UK costs for a roofline and a clean

  • Guttering, per metre£30 to £70
  • Fascia, per metre£80 to £150
  • Soffit, per metre£100 to £180
  • Pitched roof clean£450 to £850

A single written total arrives after the survey; ask whether any number you are handed has VAT and scaffolding inside it. Source: MyBuilder gutter, fascia and soffit guide and roof cleaning guide, updated 21/08/2026.

Roofing help for Southbourne's flint, peg-tile and harbour-side roofs

Southbourne roof questions, from Hermitage to Prinsted

Does flint-faced brickwork at Hermitage change how a roof edge is repaired?

It does, mostly at the flashing. A flint wall presents a bumpy face, so the lead must be dressed into the joint carefully and checked for gaps where the flints bulge. We also look for wall movement, which can drag a flashing loose. If the house is listed, as Watersedge is, ask Chichester District Council about consent before any work touches the roof edge, and keep its reply.

Is my Southbourne house inside a conservation area?

The village itself is not, but the Prinsted Conservation Area lies within the parish, and the village sits inside Chichester Harbour National Landscape. Which rules bite depends on your exact address and on whether the building is listed. Chichester District Council's planning team can settle both, and a set of photographs of the roof gives that conversation something firm to work from.

How are old peg tiles matched when a few slip?

We start by looking for sound tiles on a less visible slope that can be reused where the roof shows. New handmade clay tiles make up any shortfall, chosen for size, colour and texture. Nails and battens are tested before relaying, because slipped tiles often point to fixings that have rusted through. A machine-made pattern from another maker would stand out beside weathered handmade clay.

Will salt from the harbour shorten the life of my fascias and gutters?

It can speed up the staining. HomeBuilding notes that boards under the eaves collect salt because rain never reaches them. MyBuilder's guide has fascias and soffits replaced at 10 to 20 year intervals. An occasional wash with clean water, and gutters that fall properly to the outlet, help each board last as long as it can. Both get checked on the survey.

Roofers near Southbourne

Tell us about your roof

Describe what is happening and we will call you back to arrange a visit.

  • Photographs of what we find
  • A written quote with one total price
  • Or call 01903 299063

10-year workmanship guarantee, in writing.

Call Get a quote