A couple easily avoidable ventilation blunders we see all the time that any “Pro” should know better is easy to overlook if you don’t know better. Most everyone knows the most common type of ventilation system used to help roofs “breathe” today is Ridge Vents at the peak to let warm moist air out as it rises before it condenses along with soffit vents at the base of the attic, at the undereave/overhang of the roof.
Simple Enough, right? Well there’s lots of different products on the market today if you go shopping for a ridge vent but not all of them are created equal. Some have poor designs, less than ideal airflows for our area, but they’re cheaper and still sold on the shelves today. They’ve made lots of improvements on them since they’ve came out 20 years ago but they still sell the original ones as well which has had many flaws pointed out. This is not something you want to save a couple dollars on. You ever bought something and it just didn’t work as well as you expected, or didn’t last as long as you hoped? A good ridge vent not only helps improve the live of your roof it also helps get heat out of your attic in the summer which can help keep your house cooler, which saves you money! We only use premium ridge vents because we understand the importance of letting warm moist air out of your attic.
Soffit vents are another story. It may appear that you have soffit vents already but that doesn’t mean someone cut the hole in the wood behind the siding for it to even function as a vent instead of just merely a decoration. It sounds crazy but that’s just the start of it. Sometimes they’re covered in
paint, or blocked by insulation from inside the attic because someone thought it was a good idea to block any openings like a lot of unaware homeowners do when they try to save some money DIY style. It’s not uncommon for houses to not have any kind of overhang to even put soffit vents. In these cases, other approaches have to be thought out to keep the proper ventilation in place. Solutions like “Edge Vents” or “Breathable Fascia Boards” have to be used.
Another one of the most common ventilation problems we run into when we’re cleaning these things up is contractors that install roofs on houses with no overhang and they’re not educated about the types of vents they’re supposed to install in place of soffit vents, because the other options aren’t very popular, but the problem they cause is quite common.