Exterior cleaning in Ridge
Soft washing, roof cleaning, gutters and valleys cleared and paving brought back at Ridge, on the lane between Wareham and Arne.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
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Exterior cleaning at Ridge covers the wash and the drainage, and the wash is the simple bit. The part worth asking about is where the dirty water goes, because everything here drains towards Poole Harbour and it has almost no distance to travel. Both belong on the quote before a hose is switched on.
Houses on this lane at Ridge go green on the roof, dark on the sheltered walls and slippery underfoot. A roof slope that faces away from the sun has gone green and the moss is now sitting in the gutter. Render or painted masonry on the sheltered side of the house has darkened and streaked while the sunny side looks fine. Or the paving and the path by the door are slippery from October to April. There is usually a shed, a garage or a run of outbuildings on the list as well.
We come and survey it surface by surface, because a rendered wall, a tiled roof and a block paved drive want three different methods and two of them want hardly any pressure. You are told what will come up, what needs treating and then leaving alone to work, and what we would not touch at all. The visit is free and the written price puts each surface on its own line.
The work
What gets cleaned on the lane out to Arne
The roof, and the slope that never dries. Clay and concrete tile, and the slope facing north or east is always the one that has gone. Damp air off the harbour and the shelter of the trees mean it barely dries between one week's rain and the next, and moss holds on where the tiles overlap.
We scrape the growth off dry, soft wash the tile at low pressure and treat it with a biocide so the spores in the surface do not bring the regrowth straight back. No water goes up under the lap, because that lands it on the felt, not in the gutter, and the ridge gets checked while we are up there. On render it is green film and black streaking under sills and gutter joints: soft washed with a weak solution and rinsed at low pressure, never lanced, and where a wall greens back fast we look for the reason before booking you in again. Old brickwork with soft lime joints gets a test patch on a hidden elevation first.
Outbuildings, gutters and paving. On a plot out in Ridge the house is often not the only building: garages, stables, workshops and long single storey ranges, some of them roofed in cement fibre sheet rather than tile. That never sees a pressure washer from us. The sheets go brittle with age, older ones can hold material nobody wants turned into dust, and the honest answer is a gentle soft wash from a distance or leaving it alone. Pine needles and heath litter blow in constantly here and mat in the gutters, which makes gutter clearing a job worth booking on its own. Block paving is re-sanded after washing, and a gravel drive is raked and treated, not washed.
How it runs
Cleaning roofs, render and paving at Ridge
Thomas looks at each surface before pricing: the roof covering, the render or brick, the paving, and what is growing on each. Every surface gets the method that suits it, because the wrong pressure strips a finish along with the dirt. The quote is itemised by surface, with protection, access, and where the water and residue go on their own lines. You deal with one company from start to finish.
Plants, windows and vents are covered first. Moss is scraped off roofs by hand and a biocide is applied at low pressure, with products used under the HSE biocides regime. Ridge sits close to the harbour, so run-off is kept out of ditches and drains that lead to it, following pollution prevention guidance. Debris is bagged and the ground is rinsed and swept before we leave. If cleaning reveals cracked tiles or blown render, we point it out with a photo and a price, and leave the decision with you.
Ridge has no conservation area, and the listed entries nearby are mostly in Wareham. Cleaning a building is maintenance and needs no application. If the building is listed, Dorset Council handles listed building consent, and any cleaning of listed fabric is agreed first.
Cost
What sets the price of an exterior clean near the harbour
A square metre rate would not be fair. The same square metre can take a few minutes or much longer, depending on what has taken hold.
Height and access. A house set back behind a hedge, a bungalow with a conservatory across the back and outbuildings reached only across grass are different jobs before any water is used. Roofs need scaffold or a tower under the work at height rules, while render and paving can often be done from the ground.
The surface. Roof tiles with thick moss need scraping and a biocide wash. Render with green algae needs a soft wash, not a jet. Old brick needs low pressure to protect the face. Block paving needs the joints refilled with kiln dried sand afterwards.
Shade and damp. North facing slopes and walls near trees grow more moss and algae and take longer. A treatment that keeps them clean longer costs more than a rinse, and it is worth asking which you are getting.
Water and run-off. Near the harbour, what goes down the drain matters. Collecting or directing run-off takes time and is priced in.
Ask anyone quoting what method each surface gets, whether a biocide treatment is included, and where the run-off goes.
If there is a date
A sale, a survey or a letting date coming up
Ring and tell us the date and what it is tied to: a sale, a survey or a change of tenants. The front elevation, the drive and the path decide first impressions, and they can be done on their own ahead of the rest.
If moss has come off the roof into the gutters, tell us, because the gutters may need clearing before the next heavy rain. The first visit covers what can be done by your date and what should wait. Booked work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. For anything that cannot wait, ring, and if we cannot answer at the time we will ring you back as soon as we can.
The one local thing
Where the dirty water is allowed to end up
Ridge has no surface water sewer to send anything down. What leaves your roof and your paving goes into a gully, a soakaway or a ditch, and the ditches around Ridge run to Poole Harbour within a field or two. That is the single fact that changes how the work is planned. Planting gets soaked and sheeted before anything is mixed, so nothing lands on dry leaves. Gullies and drains near the work are covered or bunded.
Residue is contained and taken away rather than chased into the nearest grid, and on the surfaces closest to open water we work drier and slower, with less product and more dwell time, which sometimes means a second visit instead of a stronger mix. Pollution prevention guidance is what we follow on that, and Approved Document H is the reason surface water and foul drainage are kept apart in the first place.
What it should change for you is the question you put to everyone quoting. Ask where the water is going. Anybody who has not thought about it on a plot this close to the harbour has not walked the site properly, and a price that looks low is often low because containment and disposal are simply not in it.
It matters on your own account too. A patio soaked in a strong mix that drains straight into a ditch takes the pond life with it, and the neighbour whose ditch it is will know. We would rather tell you a job needs an extra visit than promise it in one and put the difference into the water.
Who you are dealing with
Who cleans houses in Ridge and around the harbour
Our base is at 80a Wolverton Road in Boscombe, on the Bournemouth side of the harbour, and Ridge is 11.9 miles out. We cover Ridge, Stoborough, Wareham, Sandford, Organford and the BH20 villages round the water, where Dorset Council is the authority.
The business trades as Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, company number 15471719, listed at Companies House for England and Wales. Thomas Hannen, the owner, looks at every surface before writing a price. One verified Checkatrade customer gave a 10 out of 10. Both the visit and the written, itemised quote are free. Before you book a visit in Ridge, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.
Planning at a glance
Do you need planning permission in Ridge?
Most repairs in Ridge need no application at all. What decides whether a change to the outside of your house does is who the council is, whether a conservation area or a listing applies, and whether the place sits in a protected landscape.
| Question | In Ridge |
|---|---|
| Who decides | Dorset Council is the planning authority for Ridge. Dorset Council's heritage pages set out what it controls. |
| Conservation area | None covers Ridge, so a like-for-like repair is ordinary maintenance. |
| Listed buildings | Yes, there are listed buildings in and around Ridge. If yours is one, work can need listed building consent. |
| Protected landscape | Inside the Dorset National Landscape (formerly AONB), so anything visible from outside gets more attention. |
Questions
Questions about exterior cleaning in Ridge
We back onto the heath at Arne. Does that make it worse?
Backing onto the heath at Arne makes the tiles green over faster. Heath and woodland on the boundary drop needles, birch seed and leaf that settle on the roof and in the gutters, and that litter holds water and feeds the moss. The covering itself is no more at risk than anywhere else. Get the gutters and valleys cleared first and the tiles treated after, because the other way round wastes the clean.
The old parts of Wareham are listed. Are we affected?
Only if the building itself is on the list. Wareham's listed buildings, the Parish Church of Lady St Mary and the Priory beside it among them, are in Wareham, which has its own conservation area, and each listing covers its own building and curtilage rather than the road. There is no conservation area at Ridge. On listed fabric we work by hand at low pressure and leave sealers and coatings alone unless the council has agreed them.
Can you clean the garage roof as well?
We can, and on an outbuilding the covering decides the method. A cement sheet or an old bitumen felt garage roof will not take a lance and cannot be walked on, so it is treated and left, never scrubbed. Where a garage sits under trees it is usually the worst surface on the whole plot. It goes on the quote as its own line so you can leave it if you would rather.
Is there anything special about working in the Dorset National Landscape?
For a clean, nothing you would notice. The designation puts scrutiny on how things look from outside, which is a planning question about materials and colour rather than about washing a building. Where it comes up is afterwards. A roof coating or a strong paint colour on a prominent elevation at Ridge is the sort of change that draws attention, and we would rather you asked Dorset Council than found out later.
The water off the roof runs toward the harbour. Is that acceptable?
It is, provided nothing goes into it that should not. Ridge drains freely and sits in the Poole Harbour catchment, so a soakaway here is not a dead end, it is the start of a route. Treatment is mixed to the label, planting is covered before we start, and the moss taken off the tiles is collected and carried off site. The nutrient rules apply to new bedrooms, not to a wash down.
Nearby, and next door
Exterior cleaning near Ridge
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Free quote
Find out what will come up, and what will not
A free site visit at Ridge, then a written itemised price with every surface on its own line. Tell us if there is a date to work to.