Fascia, soffit and guttering replacement in Alderholt

The boards. Fascia, soffit and bargeboard are one system and they tend to fail together. A timber fascia goes at the ends and behind the gutter first, where it stays wet longest, so we test it with a screwdriver, not by eye: if the point sinks in, the board has gone whatever the paint looks like.

Soffits rot from the back, and the giveaway is one that has dropped away from the wall or a section a bird has worked open. Bargeboards and the capping to a gable take the weather sideways and usually go last.

Capping, and when it is fair. Capping means screwing plastic over the old timber and calling it new. Over a sound, dry, well fixed board that is a perfectly reasonable job and we will quote it. Over rot it is a cover, not a repair, and the timber carries on softening underneath with the fixings holding into nothing. We strip the old boards off as standard so the rafter feet, the wall plate and the tilt fillet can be seen, and we make good the felt at the eaves with a support tray so the underlay drips into the gutter instead of behind it.

The gutter. Half round is what most of the older runs in Alderholt are. Ogee is the square fronted profile that sits flat against the fascia, and deepflow carries more water than half round of the same width, which matters where a long or steep slope sheds into one short run. Outlets, unions, brackets, hoppers, downpipes and shoes are renewed or refixed one at a time. Materials run from uPVC to aluminium on a long straight elevation, and cast iron on the few older properties that still have it, which we would rather re-bed and paint than rip off.

Hanging it properly. A gutter set dead level looks right from the ground and holds water in every dip all year, which is what silts an outlet and rots a bracket fixing. We set a line and re-hang to a fall towards the outlet, with the brackets close enough together that the run cannot sag between them and each one screwed into sound timber. Then water goes in at the far end and we watch it come out at the shoe, and the downpipe is clipped back with its shoe aimed into the gully rather than at the path beside it.

Ventilation and nuisance. With the soffit off, this is the cheap moment to put eaves ventilation right. Soffit vents or an over fascia vent hold an air gap above the loft insulation, and a roof space that cannot breathe is where condensation and damp timber start. Birds and wasps get in behind a rotten soffit and through a gap at the verge, so mesh and closures go on as the new boards go up, and the outlet is picked clear of the moss and debris that had it blocked.

A roofline is not priced per metre. A metre of fascia over a bay window is a different job from a metre on a straight gable.

The height and what is in the way. A bungalow on one of the newer Alderholt closes, a two storey detached with a bay under the front gutter, and a cottage with a low eaves each need a different platform. A run above a conservatory means building the scaffold around it. The work at height rules put access on a line of its own.

What the boards are hiding. Timber fascias and soffits put up in Alderholt in the eighties are old enough now for the rafter feet behind them to have taken water. Nobody knows until the old board comes off. Capping over with plastic hides the rot, which is why Thomas prices for taking the boards down.

The detail on each run. Corner returns, a satellite dish or a service cable in the way, and every outlet, hopper and downpipe are counted one by one. So is setting the fall again, because a gutter hung level holds water all year. Alderholt's sandy ground drains quickly, but where each downpipe empties still matters: it should go to a gully or soakaway, not the foot of a wall.

Ask any other roofer whether the old boards are coming off, what happens if the wall plate is rotten, and whether the scaffold is in the price.

For fascias, soffits and guttering we cover Alderholt, from the older houses to the eighties closes, along with Daggons, Cripplestyle and the SP6 villages towards Cranborne and Fordingbridge, 12.5 miles from our base in Boscombe. Dorset Council is the council here.

The firm is Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales with the number 15471719. Thomas Hannen owns it, and he is the one who comes to your house and prices the roofline himself. On Checkatrade, a verified customer rated us 10 out of 10. We charge nothing for the site visit or for the written, itemised quote. Before you book a visit in Alderholt, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.

Most repairs in Alderholt 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.