Fascias, soffits and guttering in West Moors

A single storey run is longer than it looks. A bungalow has far more eaves for the floor area than a house does, so there is more fascia, more soffit, more gutter, more brackets and usually more downpipes to renew. Add a hip at each end and a porch or a conservatory and the run stops being one straight line and becomes half a dozen shorter ones with a corner at every junction. We measure the whole building at the survey rather than the elevation you rang about, because a quote for the front alone is rarely the job you actually want.

Off, and the look underneath. Fascia, soffit, bargeboard and old gutter come off together. Cap over a soft board and the rot carries on behind it while the bracket screws quietly lose their grip, which is the job we get asked to redo more than any other. With everything down we can see the rafter feet, the wall plate and the bottom course of tiles. Soft rafter ends get a sound new end spliced on, a felt support tray goes in where the underfelt has torn back over the eaves, and a tilt fillet sets the bottom course so it drips into the gutter rather than behind it. Tiles lifted at the eaves or the verge are refixed as BS 5534 expects. Where the timber is genuinely sound and dry, capping the face and lining the soffit is a fair, cheaper job and we will tell you when that is what you have.

What the run needs. New brackets at proper centres, and the gutter re-hung falling towards the outlet. Hung level it looks perfectly straight from the drive and stands full of water all year, which perishes the union seals and keeps a board damp from behind. Half round is fine on an ordinary roof, but a bungalow with a wide shallow slope catching driving rain across its whole length can shed more water than half round will carry, and square, ogee or deepflow hold more before it goes over the back of the gutter. Every union gets a new seal, downpipes are clipped straight, hopper heads checked, and the shoe set so it discharges into a gully rather than at the wall, where it soaks the brickwork and shows as damp inside.

Materials, air and the nuisances. uPVC in white, black or woodgrain is the usual answer on this stock, timber where a moulded profile matters and primed on all four faces, cast iron repaired and repainted where it survives, aluminium where a long run is better with no unions. The eaves get put right while they are open, which on a bungalow is the part worth paying attention to: the loft is broad and shallow at the edges, insulation gets pushed hard into the gap, and the air stops moving. Soffit vents in the new panels, or an over fascia vent where the soffit is too narrow, with the air gap kept clear over the loft insulation, is what keeps that roof space dry instead of growing condensation. Approved Document F sets the eaves ventilation figures. Corners are closed against birds and wasps nesting behind a soffit, and any outlet blocked with moss and debris off the tiles is pointed out.

No rate per square metre, because a metre of fascia over a bay is not the same metre as one on a straight gable.

Getting to it. A bungalow with a hip at each end and clear lawn round it, a chalet with a dormer cheek breaking the run, and a house with a conservatory under the back gutter are three different jobs before a board comes off. A bungalow run comes off a tower, a two or three storey gable wants a scaffold, and a run over a conservatory or a bay window means building the platform around it. The work at height rules are why the access is a priced line rather than something absorbed into a rate.

What is behind the boards. Rotten fascia is a symptom. The question is whether the rafter feet and the wall plate behind it are still sound, and nobody knows until the old board comes off. Capping over with plastic hides that instead of fixing it, which is why we take the old boards off rather than clad them.

The run, not the metre. A straight gable is quick. Bay windows, a conservatory in the way, a corner return, a run that has to be worked around a satellite dish or a service cable, and every outlet, hopper and downpipe are priced one at a time. So is putting the fall back: a gutter hung level looks fine and holds water all year.

Comparing quotes? Ask whether the old boards are coming off or being capped over, what happens if the rafter feet or the wall plate turn out to be rotten, whether the gutter, outlets and downpipes are all being renewed or only the fascia, and whether the scaffold is in the price. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.

Most of West Moors went up in a fairly short stretch of years, on the same eaves detail, in the same softwood, with the same paint. That has a consequence people meet one house at a time and rarely join up: rooflines here do not fail individually, they come due as a group. If two or three houses in your road have had theirs done recently, yours is on the same clock, and the reason is not that your neighbours are keen. It is that the timber went up in the same season as yours did.

That is useful rather than depressing, because it lets you plan instead of react. A roofline replaced in a dry spell, booked when you choose, is a straightforward two day job. The same job after a length has come off in a February gale is an emergency call, wet, and usually with a damp wall to sort out as well. So if the boards on your road are starting to go, get somebody up to yours and look at the ends of each run where the brackets screw in, rather than waiting for it to announce itself. We will tell you honestly if it has a few more years, and we would rather say that than sell you something early.

We cover West Moors, Three Legged Cross, Ferndown, Verwood and St Leonards, broadly BH22, under Dorset Council. You are dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building, the trading name of 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.