Opinions Please

We don't have wood shingles over here and the closest to shingles would be slate as they are overlapped and nailed on like shingles. Our tile roofs the tiles sit on battens and lock together and only a couple of tiles per row are wired onto the batten. The wired tiles hold the other tiles locked to the batten. Most roofs in Australia are either galvanised steel, colorbond steel or baked clay roof tiles or glazed baked clay roof tiles.
Fibro cement used to be very popular in the 1950s because it is so cheap but is not used any more because it contains asbestos.

 

Here all kinds are still available. Flexible shingles usually asphalt, fiberglass and mineral mixed. I spent some years doing metal buildings with galvalume metal panels. Metal panel here are made also to copy the look of tiles and slates. Many choices. I have enough of some in a 'sea fog' color to do the street side when it comes to it.

 

Nice place by the way. Glad you found a keeper!

 

Hang on.....asphalt...on your roof Crikey over here the roads are made of asphalt and they go soft and melt in hot weather so how does that work? Maybe they are only used in cold areas so melting doesn't happen.
Wouldn't they be a real fire risk when if the house catches on fire. Over here bushfires are a regular occurrence with several major fires happening every year so we tend to have roof materials that hot ash and embers can fall on and not set the house on fire.
Hmmm .........metal roofing that looks like tiles........isn't it just as easy to have real tiles and only pay a bit more money

 

Not as heavy, the metal tiles. I've put on pallets of tile before and believe me the weight is different. But metal roofs here are good for 30 and probably more years. We actually see more just straight panel (no fastener seen) standing rib it's called. The ribs are male and female that lap over and are then seammed with a roll former. Kind of like if you clenched your fist. I've seen many still in good shape after a hurricane while shingles right besides when flying like a deck of card!

Look at Laurar's roof. It seems to be the heavier architectual fiber shingles. I believe a 20 -30 year product.

@LaruaR - nice house also! Looking at the roof I suspect it's in snow country?

 

Hey that is it and thanks for the insight Imandy Mann.......I remarked we don't see such big gables on houses in Australia when I replied to Laura's post........we don't see much snow over here thanks that is the reason for the steep gables....snow
The only areas here that see any snow is in the alpine regions on top of a couple of mountains but there are no really big towns in the alpine areas....more small villages and ski lodges that people only use for holidays.

 

I just saw in her post that it cedar shakes! Hard to tell in the photo.(Oh - there is a metal copy for that too. Would be awesome in a copper-kote metal.)

 

@joffa interesting. In the US square footage is simply measured in feet, length multiplied by the width , 75 ft x 40 ft = 3000 sq. ft. Nice size house!

I find the "Tiny House" fad amusing. I just can't vision raising kids in a tiny house of 200 to 300 sq. ft.

 

I've been in construction here where the plans called for the metal studs to ride in a deeper top track and not screwed off but kind of floating. When the super call the architect (from up north) he said it was for snow loads! We're in Panama City Florida! What were they thinking?

 

Hehehe yeah likewise.... kids need space to run around....the only time I lived in a small place was when I moved out of my parents home at 20yo and into a first floor 2 bedroom apartment with my fiance. Between the jerk downstairs that used to complain whenever we walked around our apartment and the crazy lady across the hall that was always screaming at her 3 kids and also she cooked the worst smelling food from which the smell went from her rangehood out the side of the building just down from our balcony so we got to smell it most of the time. This early experience made up my mind to always have my own place on a decent sized block and away from neighbours as soon as I could afford it. I bought my first house at 24yo.

We raised our two kids in our current house where we have lived for 27 years. We have a big 6 bedroom house with a large yard and also there is a big park down the street so the kids always had plenty of space to run around with the dog. Our current house is also in a cul de sac so there is no passing traffic so very safe for the kids when they were young.
As it gets closer it will be a bit emotional as we have so many good memories here

 

The only experience with snow I have was when I used to go skiing and I stayed in either a 36 bed ski lodge or in an apartment in an 8 storey hotel complex but I was much younger then and looking more at the girls than the buildings

 

Hey Laura we could play chip and charge from the BBQ area You could pretend you are in a deep bunker and hitting up the 4 foot bank to the green........yeah we will keep it for a while but after I put up my big workshop next year the green will probably be part of the vegetable garden my wife wants. My wife loves to garden and is very good with plants. I like to pay the lawn mowing man to do the mowing and weeding although I like sitting out in a nice garden and I like being surrounded by trees and native birds.

We have a lot of 2 storey homes over here because land is so expensive. My block is 1,480 square metres and most new blocks are less than 400 square metres so to fit a big house on a small block it has to be 2 storey. They all still have low angle gable roofs but then we don't have any snow here.....unless there is a really heavy frost it never goes much below 9ºC and right here it is winter and it is midnight and rainy but still 14ºC and we call this bloody cold

Never heard of asphalt shingles before Imandy Mann mentioned it ......over here I would presume they would melt on our 42ºC days but they might be heat stabilised somehow. Over here asphalt is used on roads and goes soft on hot days and melts on really hot days so now they put something in the asphalt mix called screened road base which makes the asphalt stronger in high temperatures

So what do you have to do to the cedar shingles? Do they rot or crack and need replacing? Surely you don't have to paint them or coat them with something.......our new house has a colorbond steel roof which is good for about 30 years. Our current house has a tile roof that has been untouched since it was built in 1972 which is 43 years and it is still going strong....the gutters were replaced in 1996 but the roof was untouched.

I really like the look of your house and it is so different to Aussie houses. It looks quite stately and regal and sitting on 1 acre of land amongst those nice tall trees it will be heaven.....maybe your mum is right and it is just meant to be

 

Yep I like the fruits of Mrs Joffa's labours and I don't mind helping with the garden but I don't like to make a habit of it

Over here you can pretty much stand on any roof as they are all low angle or flat. Tile roofs are good and when it rains they are really quiet and they perform well in high winds. Lucky our new place has lots of insulation in the roof space because tin roofs are noisy when it rains.

Yeah it sure can get hot over here Laura. I think the Victorian record is 46.2ºC in 2009 and this is 115.2ºF although Western Australia gets temps up to 50.7ºC which is 123ºF .....lucky it is only this hot a handful of times every decade
Tile roofs over here usually have a thick aluminium foil layer to help insulate the house and provided the membrane doesn't get too many holes it works well to prevent drafts through the roof taking away the heat in winter. My new house has 7 reverse cycle Daikin split system air conditioners and ducted gas central heating so we should be comfy all year round ...... Mrs. Joffa likes to turn the thermostat to "S" for sauna......but for me, I like to have it set for 20ºC which is comfy

Hey Laura, that asphalt shingles picture looks cool but what happens in a strong wind? Do they start flapping or even blow off? I guess they are nailed to sheets of wood or something because how would people be able to walk on them to do maintenance if they weren't fully supported? It is hard to tell from the picture but they seem very thin.........hmmm I think I'll stick with steel or tiles

Crap...... all the power has gone off here.......just checked the letterbox and there is a notice that the power company are doing line work and the power will be off for 6 hours.....lucky I have a big UPS

 

Those Nor easters don't look too good.....brrrrrr.....we sometimes get storm systems that blow in from Antarctica and they have really cold winds and usually hail stones.

Power companies over here pretty well do what they like because only one company distributes most of the power. You can pay your bill through many companies but they only buy the power at wholesale from the distributor and resell it to the users. When the power company wants to turn the power off for maintenance they just do it. The local businesses get angry but nothing seems to change.....Lucky it was only off for 3 hours yesterday

 

What in the world about people with home medical machines/ devices? Do they just have to have a generator. I know some folks with machines that need operating all the time and they're not necessarily mobile enough too get out to crank a generator and move plugs around. I know auto switch-over backup is available but that is an expensive option over here!

 

If you have a medical certificate that says you need power 24/7 for life support equipment then the power company will provide and connect a generator prior to doing any work. Usually people with medical equipment have a UPS that will keep their life support going for several hours in case a car hits a power pole or something.
If the power companies are planning work they tell these people first and ensure they have a continuous power supply but everyone not so much.......in my case they put a note in my letterbox probably the day before work started.
Hmmm....lucky I don't have a big fish tank like one of my friends. He has a very large saltwater tank with a coral reef and colourful reef fish and if the 5 air pumps stop for more than 15 minutes then some very expensive fish end up stressed and dead.