Fascia, soffit and guttering replacement in Bearwood
Rotten and capped fascias, dropped gutters and sagging soffits renewed across the Bearwood estates. Free site visit and a free itemised written price.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
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Fascia, soffit and guttering replacement on the Bearwood estates is usually about the fixings, the joints and the board behind the gutter, which go before the plastic does. That is a roofline job, not a roof job, and it is priced by the run, not by the house.
Bearwood estate rooflines like these tend to fail at a gutter joint, a soffit or an old plastic capping. A gutter that has dropped at one end and now pours over the joint every time it rains. A soffit sagging away from the wall with a gap you can see daylight through. And a fascia that was capped in plastic years ago, where the capping is still white and the timber behind it has turned to sponge. None of that shows properly from the pavement. We put a tower up, take a length of gutter down, and get a screwdriver into the board so you know what you are dealing with before anyone talks about money. What comes back is an itemised written price, run by run. If a length has already come down onto the drive, or rain is pouring down the wall from a failed joint, ring 07435 839745.
The work
Where an estate roofline gives up first
The parts, and which of them fail. Fascia, soffit, bargeboard and capping on the timber side. Gutter, outlets, unions, brackets, downpipes and shoes on the water side, with a hopper where a higher roof drops into a lower one. On Bearwood houses of this age the gutter often has years left in it while the clips have gone brittle, the union seals have perished and the brackets have worked loose in a board that no longer holds a screw.
Reading the run. Push a screwdriver into the fascia behind the gutter. If it sinks in, the board has rotted and nothing screwed to it will stay put. Then sight along the length: a run that dips in the middle has lost its brackets or its fall, a run leaning out at the top has pulled away from the wall, and a joint that drips only in heavy rain is a perished seal, not a blockage.
Capping, and when it is honest. Cladding over an old timber fascia looks smart on the day, and it is only right where the timber underneath is dry and firm. Over a soft board it seals the damp in, and the first you know is brackets tearing out. We take the old boards off so the rafter feet, the wall plate and the felt support tray can be seen, the tilt fillet reset and the underlay dressed to drip into the gutter.
Material and profile. Most of these Bearwood houses take uPVC and it is the sensible answer. Timber suits a painted frontage, cast iron is worth repairing where it is original, and aluminium earns its place on a long unbroken run. The square profile that came with the estates carries less water than it looks like it should, so where a big rear slope drains into one short length we will move you to an ogee or a deepflow rather than hang the same size again.
Keeping the eaves breathing. New soffits must not seal the loft up. Soffit vents or over fascia vents preserve the air gap, and closing it off is how a sound roof space turns damp in one winter, which is what Approved Document F is written around. Done properly the same detail shuts out the birds and wasps that nest behind a gapped soffit.
Where the rainwater ends up. Every downpipe has to discharge somewhere sensible: a back inlet gully, a soakaway, or a shoe onto a channel away from the wall. A shoe aimed at the house puts water into the brickwork and driving rain does the rest, so you get damp inside and a green stripe of staining outside. Blocked outlets, debris and moss off the tiles pack the same corner every autumn.
How it runs
Old timber boards out, vented uPVC in
Thomas checks the roofline himself, pressing the fascias for soft spots, looking at the soffit vents and following each downpipe to where it empties. Bearwood houses of this age often still have their original painted timber boards, or plastic that was clad over them years ago. The written quote breaks it down: access, each run's length, removing the old boards and gutter, new fascia, soffit and bargeboard, the gutter, outlets and downpipes, and disposal.
Thomas is the one you talk to about the whole roofline. On a Bearwood terrace the run often carries on over next door, so we agree where our work stops and how the new gutter joins theirs before we start. We take the old boards off instead of capping them, so the rafter feet can be checked, and if they need repair you see a photo and a price first. You are never left without a gutter overnight. Old boards and plastic leave with us, and paths are swept every evening.
Swapping fascia, soffit and gutter for new in the same place counts as repair, which means no planning application and nothing for building control. There is no conservation area over Bearwood and only three listed entries near it, and the council's list of conservation areas is there if you want to check your address. Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council would be the authority, though a straight roofline swap here needs nothing from them.
Cost
Corner plots, shared runs and rotten rafter feet
A roofline is priced by the run, not by the metre. Access. A detached house with a drive is simple. A Bearwood semi on a corner plot has a long side gable to work along, a mid terrace may mean scaffolding across a neighbour's frontage, and a conservatory under the back eaves needs a platform built round it. A bungalow comes off a tower. The work at height rules make access a line of its own.
Behind the old boards. Rot in an original timber fascia can reach the rafter feet and the wall plate. We only know once the board is off, which is why we do not cap over it.
Soffit ventilation. Roofs of this era rely on air coming in at the soffit. New soffit boards should be vented, or the loft can start to suffer from condensation.
Every corner and outlet. Corners, stop ends, outlets, hoppers and downpipes are counted one by one, and the gutter is rehung with a fall.
The downpipe at ground level. Bearwood is on shrink-swell clay, so a downpipe emptying onto the ground by the wall is worth connecting to a drain, which is what Approved Document H expects.
Put these to anyone else quoting: will the old boards be removed or covered, what if the rafter feet are rotten, are the soffits vented, and is the scaffold included?
If a section has come away
A gutter hanging over the front path
Gutter hanging loose from its brackets, a downpipe broken at the bend, or a fascia gone soft should be dealt with before the next heavy rain sends water down the brickwork. If a section is hanging over a path or a parked car, keep people clear and call; do not fill in the form.
We get it supported or safely taken down on the first visit, with the water running somewhere sensible, and price the full repair once we can see how far the rot goes. Our scheduled hours are Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. For anything like this, phone, and if nobody answers, we ring back when we are able.
Worth knowing
On a terrace the gutter is not only yours
Most of Bearwood went up in one go and the roofline went up with it, so everything here is the same age. On the terraces that matters twice over, because the gutter does not stop at your boundary. It runs continuously across the block, joined over each party wall, and it usually falls to an outlet on somebody else's elevation.
So renewing your length alone means cutting into a shared run and forming a new joint above the party wall, which is exactly where a future leak shows up in a neighbour's ceiling. It can be done and we do it, but it is worth a knock on the door first. Two or three houses together share the access and end up with one falling run rather than three lengths at three levels. If the neighbours are not interested we will still price yours alone and detail that junction properly.
Who you are dealing with
The man who checks your fascias owns the firm
Bearwood is 5 miles from our Boscombe base, and we replace fascias, soffits and gutters here and in Merley, Kinson, Wallisdown, West Howe and the rest of BH11. The local authority is Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council.
You deal with Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales, number 15471719. It is Thomas Hannen's firm, and he looks at your roofline and prices it. Checkatrade lists one verified customer's score of 10 out of 10. The site visit is free, and the written quote listing every item costs nothing. Before you book a visit in Bearwood, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.
Planning at a glance
Do you need planning permission in Bearwood?
Most repairs in Bearwood 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 Bearwood |
|---|---|
| Who decides | BCP Council is the planning authority for Bearwood. BCP Council's heritage pages set out what it controls. |
| Conservation area | None covers Bearwood, so a like-for-like repair is ordinary maintenance. |
| Listed buildings | Yes, there are listed buildings in and around Bearwood. If yours is one, work can need listed building consent. |
| Protected landscape | No National Park or National Landscape covers Bearwood. |
Questions
Questions about fascias and guttering in Bearwood
Our gutter runs into next door's. Can you do just our house?
Yes, but we form a proper joint over the party wall rather than leaving a cut end. It is worth asking the neighbour first, because doing two houses at once shares the access and gives you one run at one fall instead of two at different levels.
The gutter keeps coming loose but the fascia looks fine. Why?
Because it usually is not fine. On a capped fascia the plastic stays white while the timber behind it goes soft, and a bracket screwed into soft timber works loose every winter. Take the capping off and the answer is obvious in seconds.
Is it worth changing the gutter profile while you are up there?
Sometimes. If one short length is taking a large rear slope and it overflows every heavy shower, a deeper profile or an extra outlet fixes what cleaning it out never will. If the run is simply hung level, putting the fall back is enough.
Do we need to be at home while you do it?
Not for the roofline itself, as long as we can get to both sides of the house and stand a tower safely. We will need somewhere to put the platform and access to the back, and everything that comes off leaves with us at the end of the day.
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Get a price for your Bearwood roofline
Tell us which runs are giving trouble. Thomas comes out, gets the gutter off a section and checks the board behind it, then puts an itemised price in writing. The visit and the quote are free.