Fascia, soffit and guttering replacement in Highcliffe

A house has three boards. Fascia along the rafter ends, soffit beneath it, bargeboard climbing the gable to the verge. On the post war Highcliffe stock they are painted softwood, commonly with a cover board already screwed across the front. That comes away with everything else.

A cover board over damp timber keeps the moisture in and leaves fresh brackets biting into nothing. Where a board is genuinely dry and firm, capping is fair value and we will tell you so. Replacements are uPVC, and this near the water in Highcliffe the screws, clips and brackets are non ferrous whatever the boards are made of.

On a block. Highcliffe flats bring their own version. One long shared channel serving several homes, a single outlet doing the work of two, a hopper head at high level feeding a pipe that runs down the face of the building. When that arrangement backs up, the water shows on somebody's ceiling rather than on the path. Renewing it properly means sizing the run to the roof rather than copying what was there: half round, ogee against a square edged fascia, or deepflow where the roof simply sheds more than a standard section will move.

Behind the boards, either way. Lift the fascia and the rafter ends, the wall plate and the tilt fillet under the first course of tiles are all visible for the first time in decades. Soft ends are cut out and pieced solid. A felt support tray goes in so the underlay finishes over the board and its water arrives in the channel instead of behind it. Tiles moved to reach it are refixed as BS 5534 sets out. Brackets, unions, outlets, hoppers, downpipes and shoes are renewed as one and hung to a genuine fall, because a length put up level ponds all year.

Ventilation and the smaller work. A soffit off is the moment to build eaves ventilation in, through the panel or over the fascia, so an air gap stays open above the loft insulation and February condensation is not reported as a leak. Plenty of roofline faults in Highcliffe are far smaller than a replacement: a dripping union, a bracket pulled from soft wood, a downpipe snapped at the shoe, an outlet packed with moss and debris off the tiles. We refix, re-hang or swap that piece alone. Wasps are seen to before a board comes down, and nesting birds are given until they have gone.

A metre of fascia is not a fixed thing to price. A straight gable goes up quickly, and a bungalow with a bay, a porch and four corners takes far longer for the same length.

Access. A bungalow is a tower job and quick to move round. A two or three storey block wants a scaffold, and one over a conservatory, a bin store or a shared path takes longer to build. The work at height rules are why it is priced on its own line.

Behind the board. Rotten fascia is a sign, not the whole story. Whether the rafter feet and wall plate behind it are sound only shows once the old board is off, which is why capping over with plastic is a false economy.

The soffit material. If the old soffit tests as asbestos cement, taking it down wets it, bags it whole and sends it to a site that accepts it, so it goes on a separate line.

The coast. Salt air eats cheap steel brackets and screws. So close to the Highcliffe cliff, gutter brackets and fixings should be stainless or aluminium, and on the south west elevation, which takes the weather, the gutter wants brackets closer together. Every one of the outlets, hoppers and downpipes is counted, along with anything to work round such as a satellite dish, and the fall is set so the gutter drains rather than sitting level and holding water.

Ask anyone else whether the old boards are coming off, what the fixings are made of, and whether the soffit has been tested.

A large share of the homes in Highcliffe are flats and maisonettes, and on a leasehold flat the outside of the building, including the gutters, the hoppers, the downpipes and the boards they hang on, belongs to the freeholder and is maintained out of the service charge.

So if you are looking at water coming off a shared gutter and down the front of the block, the first job is finding out who manages it rather than booking a tradesman. We will still come and look, and put what the roofline needs in writing so you have something to send them.

If you sit on the residents' company or you are the agent, one thing is worth knowing early. Where the cost passed on to any single leaseholder goes over a set threshold, the landlord has to consult the leaseholders formally before committing, under section 20 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985. That moves the timetable, not the work, and a roofline is far easier to organise in spring than in the middle of a wet November.

From our base in Boscombe to Highcliffe is 5.7 miles. We replace rooflines in Highcliffe, Walkford, Chewton Common and down the roads towards the cliff, where Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council is the planning authority.

Thomas Hannen owns the business and does the measuring and pricing himself, so the man at your door is the man who answers for the job. On Checkatrade a verified customer marked us 10 out of 10. You pay nothing for the visit or for the written quote, which lists each run separately. Look us up as Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719. Before you book a visit in Highcliffe, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.

Most repairs in Highcliffe 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.