Exterior cleaning in Minstead
Roof, render, gutter, drive and patio cleaning across Minstead and the Forest villages. Soft wash and treatment, never a lance on an old surface.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
Almost everything we are asked to clean in Minstead is green because the building sits in shade under trees, not because anything on it has failed. A soft wash with a proper biocide lifts moss, algae and lichen without taking the surface off, and on an old roof or old brickwork that is the only method we will use.
People here ring us for three reasons. The roof has gone green enough to see from the lane. The shaded side of the house has turned grey and streaked while the sunny side still looks fine. Or the gutters have stopped coping and water is running down the wall every time it rains. All three are the same underlying problem in a village this heavily wooded, and all three are maintenance rather than repair.
We come out, walk the whole property, and tell you which surfaces are worth cleaning, which want treating and leaving to weather off, and which we would not touch. Then you get it in writing, surface by surface, before anybody books a day.
The work
What actually needs cleaning on a forest lane
Roof cleaning, and why not with a jet wash. The roofs we get called to here are clay tile, concrete tile and natural slate, all of them overhung by oak, holly and beech that were there long before the house. Moss packs into the laps, holds water against the tile and pushes it out of line. We scrape it out of the laps and off the ridge by hand, clear the valley properly, then treat what is left with a biocide so the spores die back instead of regrowing by spring. What we will not do is put a pressure washer on it. The force strips the fired face off a clay tile and washes the mortar out from under the ridge, and you end up buying a roof to fix something cosmetic.
Shaded elevations here go black and streaked years before an open one does. Painted render and pebbledash both come up with a low pressure soft wash and a treatment left to work, which is slower to look impressive and far safer than a lance held close. On pebbledash in particular, pressure knocks the stones out and there is no putting them back. A good number of the older cottages around the green are soft brick in lime mortar, and those want the gentlest thing that works, tested on a small panel out of sight first, because the risk is not the dirt coming off, it is the face of the brick coming off with it. If a wall is better left alone, we will say so.
Gutters, drives and what we leave alone. Clearing gutters is the job we do most in Minstead and the one that saves the most money. Leaf litter, needles and blown moss fill the gutter, the outlet blocks, and the overflow soaks the wall below it all winter. Clearing them out, flushing the downpipe through and checking the run is ordinary maintenance, and under mature trees it wants doing more than once a year. Gravel, block paving and stone paving all go green and slippery in shade: block paving comes up under controlled pressure and then wants a re-sand, because the wash takes the jointing sand out with the weed. We will tell you honestly whether a seal is worth it on your drive or whether it will just trap what is underneath. Thatch does not get cleaned, by us or by anyone, and nor do we take a lance to solar panels, lead flashing or a flat roof that is already patched.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
One team from the first visit to the last, one person to ring, and no sub-contracting. The quote is itemised: method for each surface, protection, access and where the water and residue go. If something turns up that nobody could have seen, you get a photograph and a price before we carry on. A wash is maintenance, so it needs nobody's permission. What can need permission is what people do afterwards: painting brick that has never been painted, or sealing a front garden that drains nowhere. Minstead sits inside the New Forest National Park rather than a district council area, the village is in the Forest Central conservation area with eleven listed entries, and the National Park sets out what needs consent.
Cost
What decides the price of a clean
No rate per square metre: the same square metre can be twenty minutes or two. A low cottage on a forest lane, a two storey rendered house and a long run of garage and outbuilding roofs are three different reaches before anybody turns a tap on. Reach poles do a lot of it, and the work at height rules decide the rest. The surface sets the method, and getting it wrong takes the surface off with the dirt. Comparing quotes, ask what method each surface gets, whether a treatment is included or just a rinse, and where the run off goes.
If there is a date
A viewing, a visit or a deadline
Ring rather than use the form. This is not emergency work, but it often has a date on it: a sale, a letting inspection, scaffolding coming down. Minstead is the far side of the Forest from us, so we will tell you the day we can actually get to you rather than promise you tomorrow. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
The one local thing
Cleaning inside the Forest Central conservation area
Minstead falls in the Forest Central (South) conservation area, and the National Park is the planning authority here rather than the district. That sounds like a problem for a cleaning job and mostly it is not. Washing a roof, a wall or a drive changes nothing about the appearance of the building except that it is clean, so it is maintenance and you do not need to ask anyone.
It is the step after the clean that catches people out. Sealing paving, putting a coloured or textured coating on render, or painting a brick or stone elevation that has always been bare are all changes of appearance, and in a conservation area that is a planning question you want answered before the scaffold goes up rather than after.
The other thing worth knowing is that there are eleven listed entries in the village, most of them cottages and farm buildings rather than anything grand. On a listed building the risk runs the other way from the usual one.
Too much pressure can strip old limewash that is part of what is listed, or open up a lime joint that then takes water in, and putting either back is a job for a specialist rather than a cleaner. So on anything old we test a panel where nobody looks, work at the lowest pressure that shifts the growth, and lean on the treatment doing the work over the following weeks instead of the lance doing it in an afternoon.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover the Forest villages from Minstead and Lyndhurst across to Cadnam and Bartley, and SO43 is a regular run for us. 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
Minstead questions we get asked
We are in the Forest Central conservation area. Does cleaning need consent?
Washing does not. Minstead sits in the Forest Central (South) conservation area, and that controls how a building looks, so like for like upkeep is fine and a change of covering or material is not. Cleaning falls on the upkeep side of that line. Where it starts to matter is a coating or a colour change afterwards, because that alters appearance and the New Forest National Park Authority would want to see it.
The cottage is under oaks and never sees sun. Worth cleaning?
It is, so long as you accept it will not stay clean as long as an open plot would. Tree cover round Minstead keeps the roof damp and drops leaf litter into the valleys and gutters right through autumn, and the ground here is impeded so what washes down sits rather than soaking away. We do the covering, then the treatment, and clear the gutters and valleys on the same visit.
Is anything you spray a problem inside the National Park?
It is handled the way it would be anywhere, only with more care about where it lands. Minstead drains poorly, so surplus liquid sits near the surface instead of soaking down, and past the garden boundary here you are straight into open Forest. Everything is mixed to the stated dilution, the borders are covered first, and the growth that comes off is collected and carried away. Nothing goes down a drain.
Ours is one of the listed cottages. What changes for you?
The tools change. Eleven entries at Minstead are listed, the Church of All Saints included, and buildings of that age have lime mortar, soft handmade brick and often a plain tile or thatched roof that a jet would wreck. We work at low pressure by hand and let the treatment do the slow part. Consent is not needed for a clean, but it is for anything that seals or recolours a surface.
The lane is single track. Where would the van and tower go?
On your ground, if there is anywhere to put it. The lanes into Minstead are narrow and there is nowhere to leave a van and a tower without blocking somebody, so parking gets looked at on the first visit and the order of elevations is planned around it. Where nothing will fit we work from lightweight poles off the ground and keep the vehicle tucked in for as short a stretch as possible.
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Exterior cleaning near Minstead
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Free quote
Get a written price for the clean
Free site visit anywhere in SO43. We price each surface separately so you can take the lot or just the gutters.