Inspecting a Roof

Things to look for when inspecting a roof...

While looking at a house, I came upon these problems.

In this picture you will notice three things.
1. It looks like someone stepped on the roof and split the sheathing. Which is not a huge problem. Simply replacing the sheathing when redoing the roof would fix the problem.
- might want to look at the rest of the sheathing, this
failure is an indication that all the sheathing might need
to be replaced; which could get costly if not thought of
a head of time.
2. The sistering of the main beam is not only poorly done, but is also not straight.
- could mean that the whole roof structre is poorly
constructed, and needs to be replaced.
- be aware of other similiar spots
3. The virtical supports in the bottom left are not supporting anything.
- could mean the roof has shifted, indicating other issues
such as poor foundation, or settling.
- roof is not support properly

This is another picture taken of the vertical supports.

1. Notice that the beam running from the top left to the middle of the picture goes from a two board thickness to a one board thickness.
- in my opinion this is not correctly done, and is not
structurely safe.
2. One can also guess that the background of the picture is an add on because of the wall that is cut through, and the newer look of the wood

This is another view of where is looks like someone stepped on the roof, and broke the sheathing 1. Also looks like the roof has leaked and/or is
rotten in some areas

In this picture you will notice that the roof beam is not straight. You can also kind of see that the right beam has a crack running through it. It is there, kind of hard to see.

Nothing looks out of place here, just lots of spider webs and insolation.

Here is one of three cracks that I saw in the main beam. It runs about two feet from start to finish, and is completely through the whole beam top to bottom, and width wise.