Re-Roofing an Older Home in Burbank's Media District: What Hides Under the Shingles
The older neighborhoods around Burbank's studio district hide decades of roofing history under the surface. Here is what a re-roof on one of these homes really involves and where the surprises wait.
Decades of homes, decades of roofing history
Walk the older residential streets around Burbank's media district, through Magnolia Park, the Rancho, and the neighborhoods that filled in during the postwar boom, and you are looking at homes that have stood for the better part of seventy or eighty years. These are not the newest houses in the Valley, and that is exactly what makes their roofs interesting. A roof on a home like this has very often been re-roofed more than once over the generations, sometimes carefully and sometimes not, and what is under the current surface is frequently a layered record of every owner who patched, covered, or replaced it before you got there.
That history is the whole reason re-roofing an older Burbank home is different from re-roofing a recent build. On a newer house you generally know what you will find under the shingles. On a postwar home that has changed hands several times you do not, and a roofer who quotes the job as a simple tear-and-replace without accounting for what the decades may have left up there is either inexperienced with these homes or not being straight with you. The right approach starts from the assumption that an older Burbank roof holds surprises and plans for finding and handling them honestly.
What we tend to find under an older Burbank roof
The first common discovery is layers. Older Burbank homes were frequently re-roofed by simply laying new shingles over the old ones, sometimes more than once, and a roof carrying two or three layers of accumulated roofing is heavier than it should be and hides whatever is happening on the deck below. That weight matters, and so does the fact that you cannot trust a roof you cannot see the bottom of. The second discovery, often revealed once those layers come off, is the deck itself. Many of these homes were built with skip-sheathing, spaced boards rather than the solid plywood deck a modern roof expects, and depending on the new roofing material that may need to be addressed before anything new goes down.
Then there is the damage the years left behind. Old leaks that were patched on the surface rather than fixed at the source often leave dry rot in the sheathing or the rafters underneath, invisible until the roof is open. Original flashing at the chimneys and the wall transitions may be long past its life. And the ventilation on a postwar Burbank home is frequently inadequate by any modern standard, which in the Valley heat has been quietly cooking the roof from below for decades. A real re-roof on one of these homes is as much about discovering and correcting what is underneath as it is about the new surface on top.
- Multiple layers of old roofing laid over one another
- Skip-sheathing rather than a solid modern deck
- Dry rot in the sheathing or rafters from old, surface-patched leaks
- Original flashing at chimneys and walls long past its life
- Inadequate ventilation that has aged the roof from below in the Valley heat
Doing it right, and respecting the home
The honest way to re-roof an older Burbank home is a full tear-off, not another layover. Stripping the roof down to the deck is the only way to see what the decades have left up there, deal with the layers and the weight, find and replace any rot, address the deck and the flashing, and correct the ventilation while the roof is open. Yes, it is more work than slapping another layer on top, but it is the difference between a roof that lasts and one that simply hides the next problem until it becomes an expensive one. A crew that offers to lay over the old roof on a home like this is selling you the cheap version of the wrong answer.
There is also the matter of respecting what these homes are. The older neighborhoods of Burbank have a settled character worth keeping, and a re-roof should fit it rather than fight it. On the homes where the look matters, that means choosing materials and profiles in keeping with the home, and on tile or other distinctive roofs salvaging and reusing what is sound. A good roofer should care about that as much as the homeowner does, talking through the options that honor the home rather than defaulting to whatever is fastest and cheapest for the crew.
Because an older roof holds unknowns, the honest way to price the work is to be clear about that up front. We give a written estimate for the scope we can see, and we are explicit that a tear-off may uncover deck rot or other hidden conditions, which we will document with photos and discuss with you before doing the extra work, never after the fact and never as a surprise on the bill. On a home this old, that transparency is the only fair way to handle the unknowns, and it is how we approach every older Burbank re-roof we take on.
If you own an older home in Burbank's media district or one of the surrounding postwar neighborhoods and the roof is reaching the end, a free inspection is the place to start. We will tell you honestly what is likely under the surface and what a proper re-roof involves. Call 213-573-1171.
Call 213-573-1171 and we will inspect the roof and quote it in writing.