Fascia, soffit and guttering replacement in Merley

The first morning: everything comes down. Fascia, soffit and bargeboard, plus whatever cover board was screwed across the front of them at some point in the past. Merley estates like this were built with a generous overhang in painted softwood, and cladding that overhang instead of repairing it has been the standard shortcut for thirty years.

It hides what is happening and does nothing to stop it, and it leaves the gutter fixed to a board that no longer grips a screw. Over dry, firm timber we are happy to cap, and will say so plainly.

Then the part you have never seen. Rafter ends, the plate carrying them, and the tilt fillet that raises the lowest row of tiles are all exposed once the fascia is off. Anything soft is cut away and replaced with solid timber before a single new board is offered up. A felt support tray goes in next, so the underlay finishes over the front edge and its water is delivered into the channel rather than down the back of it. Tiles lifted in the process are refixed as BS 5534 requires.

The second day: the rainwater goods. Brackets at proper centres, unions, outlets, hopper heads, downpipes and shoes, all new, all hung to a real fall towards the outlet. Set level, a length looks perfect from the road and holds standing water twelve months a year. Profile is a genuine choice: half round for most, ogee where the fascia is square edged, deepflow where a wide hipped roof puts more through one channel than a standard section can shift. Iron is almost unknown on these Merley roads, aluminium is worth a figure on a long exposed elevation, and any pipe currently emptying onto a border instead of into a gully or a soakaway gets moved while we are there.

Before it is closed up. Eaves ventilation goes in with the new soffit, either as vented panels or over fascia vents where the board is shallow, holding an air gap above the loft insulation. Smaller faults never need this much: a dripping joint, a perished union, a bracket torn out of soft wood, a length that has sunk out of fall, a snapped shoe, an outlet solid with moss and debris off the tiles. Those get refixed, re-hung or swapped piece by piece. Wasps are dealt with first, and a nest behind a soffit is sealed only after the birds have finished rather than with them still in it.

We don't price a roofline by the metre. A metre over a bay window is not the same as a metre along a straight gable.

Height and what is in the way. A bungalow run is tower work. A two storey detached house with a conservatory across the back means building the platform round it. The work at height rules make access its own line.

What is behind the board. Capping rotten timber with plastic hides the problem. It fixes nothing. We take the old fascia off, and only then can anyone see whether the rafter feet are sound.

Corners and bays. A hipped roof has more corners and more joints than a gable. Every outlet, hopper and downpipe is priced one at a time, and so is setting the gutter to a proper fall.

Where the downpipes discharge. Merley sits on sand and gravel over the Poole Formation. A downpipe emptying onto the soil by the wall keeps the footings wet, so we check each one runs to a gully or a soakaway, in line with Approved Document H.

Soffit ventilation. New soffits usually carry vents so the roof space can breathe, and that is part of the job, not an extra.

When comparing, ask whether the old boards come off or get capped over, what happens if the rafter feet are rotten, whether the downpipes are included, and whether the scaffold is priced in.

Merley went up quickly, and most of it in the same stretch of years. The roofs went on with a felt underlay and an eaves detail that relied on air simply finding its way in around the edges, which worked well enough until people started topping up the loft insulation.

Push the insulation out over the wall plate and you close the gap the air was using. The moisture from the house has nowhere to go, it condenses on the cold underside of the roof, and by February there are damp marks on the ceiling and everyone starts talking about a leak.

That is the one reason we would push you to renew the boards and not cap over them. With the fascia off, fitting proper eaves ventilation is a small extra rather than a job of its own: a continuous soffit vent, or an over fascia vent where the soffit is too narrow, plus a tray that holds the insulation back off the wall plate and keeps the air gap open. If you have had the loft topped up in the last few years and the ceilings have started marking since, that is the first thing to look at, not the tiles.

Our base is on Wolverton Road in Boscombe, 6.6 miles from Merley. We cover Merley, Oakley, Canford Magna, Broadstone and Corfe Mullen, broadly BH21, and the council is Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole for all of it except Corfe Mullen, which is Dorset Council.

Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd is the company, registered in England and Wales, number 15471719. Thomas Hannen runs it, and he is the person who checks your boards and gutters and prices them. The firm holds a verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. You pay nothing for the visit or for the written quote, which lists every item. Before you book a visit in Merley, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.

Most repairs in Merley 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.