Exterior cleaning in Ashley Heath
Roof moss, pine needles in the gutters, green render and slippery paving across Ashley Heath and BH24. Free site visit, free written itemised quote.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
The cheapest thing you can do to a house in Ashley Heath is have the gutters cleared and the roof treated before the moss gets deep. The most expensive is to leave it, then let somebody take a pressure lance to a concrete tile roof to catch up.
The calls come in three shapes. Pine needles and moss have filled the gutters, so every downpipe is either overflowing at the joint or discharging into nothing much. The roof has gone dark and the neighbours have had theirs done. Or the drive and the patio have gone green and slippery under the trees, which on ground this shaded happens faster than anywhere open.
What we do about it is simple enough to say and worth saying properly. The site visit is free and it covers the whole property, roof, walls, rainwater goods and paving, not just the surface you rang about. Where a surface is doubtful we put a small test area down and let you see the result before you commit to it.
Then you get a written itemised quote with a method named against each surface: what gets a pressure wash, what gets a soft wash at low pressure, what gets a treatment and time, and what we would leave alone.
The work
Cleaning seventies and eighties houses in Ashley Heath
WORK The concrete tile roofs. Ashley Heath filled in through the seventies and early eighties, and half the stock dates from 1945 to 1982, which means big interlocking concrete tiles on a shallow pitch. They are a good roof and a poor host for a pressure lance. The colour is a thin cement face, and once it is stripped the tile drinks water and greens over faster than it did before, so we take moss off dry, scrape by hand where it has built up at the lap, and put an approved biocide on to kill the spore that is left. On a shallow pitch the moss holds water against the tile for longer, which is why so many roofs of that vintage here look worse than older roofs down the road. With 52.2% of the housing single storey, most of that work happens off a pole rather than a platform. Gutters and outlets, with pines over them. This is the job that matters most in Ashley Heath and the one people leave longest. Mature pines drop needles into a gutter all year, not only in autumn, and needles knit into a mat water cannot get through. We clear by hand and by vacuum, flush every run to the outlet, check each downpipe is taking water into a gully rather than onto the drive, and wash the fascia and soffit faces while the access is there, with the planting underneath sheeted and the drain at the foot of the downpipe protected before anything is flushed. Dry dash and painted render on the porches, gable panels and garden walls of that era all get a soft wash: low pressure through a wide nozzle, often none at all. Force on a rendered panel finds the weak mortar first and takes the dash with it. The elevations that green first are the ones the sun never reaches, which around here usually means the side facing the trees, where algae films the render and lichen sits on the coping above it. Tarmac from when the houses were built, block paving added later, slabs at the back. Paving is where a pressure wash genuinely belongs, and block paving gets the black spot off and fresh kiln dried sand brushed into the joints afterwards so it keeps its interlock. Tarmac takes a lower pressure than people expect, because the binder is the first thing a lance lifts. Conservatory panels and the box gutter behind them are done by hand, and that box gutter is usually what causes the leak people blame on the conservatory.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
RUNS Ashley Heath has no conservation area of its own and a single entry on the national list in this area, so for practically every house here a clean is maintenance and there is nothing to apply for. Dorset Council is the authority for this address. Two exceptions are worth knowing: on a listed property, taking a coating or a patina off an old elevation can need listed building consent rather than counting as cleaning, and any plan to paint or coat a wall afterwards is a separate question from the wash itself. The written quote splits method, access and disposal by surface so you can compare it line by line, and where the water and residue end up sits on that quote because it is a pollution question.
Cost
What decides the price of a clean
The measurement people expect us to quote from is the one that matters least. A wide fronted bungalow you can pole from your own drive, a chalet bungalow with a dormer and a steeper front pitch, and a detached house set well back behind mature pines with the van a long way from the nearest tap are three different half days before any water moves. Where a pole will not reach, a tower goes up, and the work at height rules are why that is a priced line. Ask whether a second visit is part of the job.
If there is a date
A viewing, a visit or a deadline
Ring rather than use the form. The date is usually a sale, an inspection or scaffolding coming down. Give us the actual day and we will tell you honestly whether it can be done properly by then. Ashley Heath is one of the closer villages to us, so a BH24 date is usually workable at short notice. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
A bungalow is twice the roof and half the access
More than half the homes in Ashley Heath are bungalows, and that changes the sums on an exterior clean in two directions at once. Spread the same floor area over one storey instead of two and you get roughly twice the roof, twice the ridge and hip, and a gutter run that goes right round the building.
So there is more surface to clean and more rainwater goods to clear than the size of the house suggests, and a quote that looks high against a neighbour's two storey semi may simply be measuring more roof.
The other direction is access, and it is the good news. Almost everything on a bungalow is within reach of a pole from your own ground, so there is frequently no tower and no scaffold on the price at all, which is the single biggest line on most two storey work. That is why it pays to do the roof, the gutters, the fascia and the render in one visit here rather than one a year: you are paying to get somebody to the surface once.
Two warnings that are specific to living at ground level. You will not see your own roof, so the first sign is usually moss on the path after a gale, and by then the gutters have had it for a while. And low eaves mean rain bounces off the ground onto the bottom of the wall, so the dirtiest strip of a bungalow is often the first half metre above the paving rather than anything up high.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Ashley Heath, St Leonards and St Ives, and out through BH24 to Ringwood, West Moors and Three Legged Cross, with Dorset Council as the authority for this address. Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, which you can look up in a minute. Thomas Hannen's business, and he is the one who comes out to price the job, not a salesman. A verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written quote are both free.
Questions
Ashley Heath questions we get asked
Can the whole thing be done from the ground?
On most Ashley Heath houses it can. Bungalows are 52.2% of the dwellings here, and a single storey eaves line sits well inside the reach of a fed pole, so there is no scaffold and no ladder leaning on a gutter. Two storey work, steep hips and anything in a valley are the exceptions, and Thomas says at the visit which way a particular property goes.
Why does the flat garage roof go green before the house?
Because it holds water and debris and never properly dries. The heath and pine around Ashley Heath drop needle all year, and on a felt or fibreglass deck that sits in a wet mat instead of washing off. We lift it by hand and rinse gently rather than lancing it, since the seams and the upstand at the wall are exactly what a jet finds and opens first.
Is there anything listed here I need to worry about?
Almost nothing. Ashley Heath has a single listed entry and no conservation area of its own, so for the overwhelming majority of houses a wash is maintenance and needs no application to Dorset Council at all. The distinction worth holding onto is that cleaning is never the problem, while changing a covering or a colour can be. If yours is the exception we will say so before quoting.
What goes first on a 1970s hipped roof?
The bedding on the hips and the ridge. Just over half of Ashley Heath went up between 1945 and 1982, at 51.1%, and the sand and cement of that period has generally cracked away at the hip ends where the mortar runs thinnest. A wash exposes that rather than causing it. We photograph anything loose while we are up there and put it on the quote as its own item.
How quickly can someone come out and look?
Ashley Heath is about eight miles from the yard, so a look at the property is normally a matter of days rather than weeks. Thomas walks the perimeter himself, gets a ladder on the gutter line where it is safe to, and leaves you with a written itemised quote. Neither the visit nor the quote is charged for, and nobody follows it up with a phone call you did not ask for.
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Have it looked at before it gets deep
Roof, gutters, render and paving, priced surface by surface. Free site visit, free written itemised quote, and a test area wherever the surface is doubtful.