Soffit is the most functional thing on the outside of your house that nobody ever looks at. It is your attic’s air intake, and when it stops working the damage happens where you cannot see it.
A roof breathes from the bottom up. Cool air enters through vented soffit at the eaves, travels up through the attic, and exits through ridge or roof vents. That airflow does two critical jobs in an Ontario climate.
In winter it keeps the roof deck cold. A cold deck means snow on the roof stays snow instead of melting, running down to the cold eave and refreezing into an ice dam that backs water up under the shingles. In summer it flushes out heat that would otherwise bake your shingles from below and drive your cooling costs up.
Block the soffit — with insulation stuffed into the eaves, with solid panel where vented should be, or with paint over the perforations — and you get ice dams, damp insulation and eventually mould on the underside of the sheathing. It is a quiet failure, and it is expensive by the time it is visible.
Fascia
Fascia is the board your eavestrough hangs from, and it takes water off the roof edge for decades. On older homes here it is usually wood, and usually the first thing to rot — particularly where an eavestrough has been leaking at a joint or overflowing for a few seasons.
Rotted fascia cut out and replaced rather than capped over
Aluminum capping over sound wood for a maintenance-free finish
Full aluminum fascia on new construction
Colour matched to the soffit, trough and trim
Capping over rot is the wrong answer
Aluminum capping over a rotten fascia board looks perfect and does nothing. The wood keeps failing behind it, the eavestrough fasteners lose their grip, and eventually a loaded trough comes off the house. We open it, show you what is there, and replace what needs replacing before anything gets capped.
How we work
Built for an Ontario winter
Everything we hang on the outside of a house has to survive roughly a hundred freeze-thaw cycles a year. That changes the details.
We look behind it first. On any tear-off we open a section and tell you what the wall is actually doing before quoting the whole job.
Room to move. Vinyl expands and contracts a long way between February and August. Fastened tight, it buckles and splits. We hang it.
Water gets out. House wrap lapped so it drains, flashing that sheds outward, kickouts where a roof meets a wall.
One trade, one edge. Siding, soffit, fascia and eavestrough all meet at the same line. Doing them together is how that line ends up straight.
Every photo is a Cave-Men job in southwestern Ontario. Tap any one to see it full size.
Questions
Soffit & Fascia FAQ
Why does my soffit need to be vented?
It is your attic's air intake. Cool air in at the soffit, warm air out at the ridge - that airflow keeps the roof deck cold in winter, which is what prevents ice dams, and flushes heat out in summer. Blocked soffit is a leading cause of ice damming in Ontario homes.
Can you just cap my old fascia instead of replacing it?
Only if the wood underneath is sound. Capping over rot hides it perfectly and changes nothing - the board keeps failing and the eavestrough fasteners lose their hold. We will open it and show you before deciding.
Do you do soffit and eavestrough at the same time?
Usually, and it is the sensible way. They meet at the same roof edge, so doing both in one visit means one set of ladders, one colour match and one price rather than two.
