Exterior cleaning in Winterborne Stickland
Roofs, walls, render, gutters, paths and decking in Winterborne Stickland and DT11. 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.
Almost everything we are asked to clean in Winterborne Stickland is green because it is in shade, not because it is neglected. That changes the answer. On a property under trees the job is a treatment that kills what is rooted in the surface, plus a plan for the leaf fall every autumn, rather than a hard wash once every few years that looks marvellous in October and is back to square one by March.
People ring us here about a handful of things. The path or the steps to the door are green and genuinely dangerous in wet weather. The gutter has stopped taking water because it is full of leaves and roof moss together. A north facing roof slope has gone dark and is dropping growth into the guttering below it. A rendered or colourwashed wall has gone patchy and grey. Or there is a date on it: a sale, a letting inspection, or family coming.
The free site visit is a proper survey of each surface, not a walk round the front. You get a written itemised quote with the method written next to every surface on it, and an honest word about the two or three things on your property that we would leave alone.
The work
Cleaning under the beeches, up a chalk combe
A shaded pitch is a mat, not a film. The coverings here run from clay plain tile and slate on the old houses to concrete interlocking tile on the later ones, with thatch on some of the cottages. On a slope that sits under a tree line the moss is not a film, it is a mat, and it beds into the lap where each course covers the one under it until water is being pushed sideways rather than down. The bulk comes off dry, scraped and brushed working down from the ridge, and only then a soft wash with a biocide, so the spores in the face of the tile die rather than wash into the gutter to start again. Slate gets no jet wash, ever, and thatch we do not clean at all.
Flint, brick and colourwash. The older walls in the village are flint and rubble with brickwork dressings round the openings, plenty of it rendered, pebbledashed or colourwashed, and every bit of it bedded in lime. Lime is meant to be the sacrificial part, softer than the brick or the flint, so a lance takes the joint out first and drives water into a solid wall that has no cavity to shed it. The old fabric gets brushed dry, then a biocide through a soft wash nozzle at low pressure. Green algae goes within days; the grey freckling on render is lichen and dies back over weeks.
With mature trees over a good part of the village, guttering fills with leaf litter as well as roof moss and the two together set into something water runs straight over, so every outlet and downpipe is flushed until it can be seen taking water. On a valley side everything is worse, because water runs rather than sits and surfaces stay wet for longer. Block paving takes a rotary surface cleaner and then re-sanding, while old brick and stone paths bedded on lime or sand take low pressure and a treatment. Decking under a canopy is the most slippery thing on most properties here, and it gets low pressure rather than a lance. Drains and any gully are covered before a product is mixed, planting and banks sheeted and watered down, and products approved for the surface go on at the strength on the label, which is what the biocides regime the HSE administers requires. Run off is steered onto ground that will take it rather than allowed to sheet down the slope into a road drain, which is what pollution prevention guidance is for.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
Same team throughout, one person to ring, and an itemised quote with method, access, protection and the run off on separate lines. Cleaning is maintenance, so there is nothing to apply for and no notice to give. What is worth knowing is what sits underneath it. There is a conservation area over the village and twenty-five listed entries in and around the parish, the church of St Mary among them, so if the wash uncovers open joints or blown render on a listed building, that repair needs listed building consent before anyone touches it. Dorset Council is the planning authority for this address.
Cost
What decides the price of a clean
No rate per square metre, because the same square metre can be twenty minutes or two. Access decides most of it: a single storey cottage on the street is hand work off the ground, a two storey house set into the valley side often means poles from an awkward standing, and a property up a long lane means water and kit carried the last part of the way. work at height rules decide when a tower replaces a pole. Lime bedded walls take none at all. Ask each quote what method goes on each surface, whether a second visit is included, and where the water goes.
If there is a date
A viewing, a visit or a deadline
Ring rather than use the form. Not emergency work, but usually work with a date on it. Winterborne Stickland is at the far end of what we cover, so we plan work up here in blocks rather than as single visits, and if you give us the date we will tell you straight which week we can be over. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
Shade is the thing you are really paying to deal with
The village sits in a narrow chalk valley with steep sides and a lot of mature tree cover, and that one fact explains most of what goes wrong on the outside of a house here. Shade means a surface stays wet for hours or days longer after rain than the same surface half a mile out on the open down.
Moss, algae and lichen need damp more than they need anything else, so they establish faster, root deeper and come back sooner. It is why the north facing roof slope is always the bad one, why the path on the shaded side of the house is the slippery one, and why a clean that holds for four or five years on an open site might only hold for two here.
The honest advice that follows is not what most firms will tell you. First, treat rather than blast, because on a rooted growth pressure only removes the visible part and leaves the surface ready to regreen. Second, budget for the gutters every autumn rather than for a full clean every couple of years, since leaf fall from mature trees is what actually blocks things and that is a cheap regular job rather than an expensive occasional one.
Third, if a single overhanging limb is keeping one elevation permanently dark, getting that cut back will do more for the house than anything we can sell you, and we will say so. And when you compare prices, ask how long the firm expects the work to hold on a shaded elevation. Anyone who gives you the same answer for the sunny front and the dark back has not looked properly.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Winterborne Stickland and the villages along the North Winterborne on DT11, out to Winterborne Whitechurch, Stourpaine, Bryanston and Blandford Forum, with Dorset Council as the local planning authority. 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
Winterborne Stickland questions we get asked
Can the slippery path by the house be sorted properly?
Yes, but with a treatment rather than a wash. Algae grows down in the pores of the paving, so a jet removes the top of it and leaves the rest, which is why it is back by the following November. We wash it, let it dry, then put a biocide on and leave it alone. Under the tree cover in Winterborne Stickland that treatment is the difference between one winter of grip and three.
Does a roof clean stop the gutters blocking up?
It helps for a season and it is not the whole answer. Most of what fills a gutter in Winterborne Stickland comes off the trees rather than off the tiles, so clearing moss removes one source and leaves the leaf litter behind. We do the gutters after the roof, not before, because a wash carries a surprising amount of grit down into them. A gutter silted solid needs taking down and flushing properly.
The village is a conservation area. Does that reach the outbuildings?
It reaches anything visible. The Winterborne Stickland Conservation Area is about appearance, so cleaning a barn or a cottage roof is maintenance while re-covering it in something different is not. There are 25 listed entries in the village as well, and the older farm buildings tend to have the softest fabric. In practice we wash and treat rather than change anything, and any decision on materials stays with you and Dorset Council.
Can the garden walls and the decking be done together?
Doing them together saves setting up twice. The awkward part in Winterborne Stickland is the old walls, generally lime pointed and no place for a lance, so those are brushed and treated by hand while decking is washed at low pressure along the grain. Both appear on the quote separately from the house. If a wall has lost its coping and is taking water down the middle, that gets pointed out before washing.
What do you look at on the survey before quoting?
The state of the ridge and verge bedding, the gutter falls, whether walls are lime or cement pointed, and where the water can safely go. On a Winterborne Stickland plot that last one matters, because gardens run out to open ground and there is often no mains gully to use. Thomas Hannen does that walk round himself and writes the quote from it. Nothing is charged for the walk round or the quote that follows.
Nearby, and next door
Exterior cleaning near Winterborne Stickland
Exterior cleaning nearby
Our other trades in Winterborne Stickland
Everything we do in Blandford Forum Exterior cleaning, all areas Every area we cover
Free quote
Get a written price for Winterborne Stickland
Free site visit, free written itemised quote, and an honest word on how long the work will hold.