Everton gutter cleaning, the whole run at once
Most of the village is single storey, so the access is the cheap part and there is no sense in doing half the house. We clear it, flush it and prove it.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
On a bungalow the gutter is the easiest part of the building to look after and the easiest to forget. Almost every run in Everton is within reach of a ladder or a pole, so there is no good reason to do the front and leave the back.
The calls come in two shapes. Either water is coming over the front edge somewhere and there is now a wet stripe down the wall under it, or somebody has looked up on a dry day, seen a line of green growing out of the gutter and decided it has gone on long enough.
Either way the visit is the same. Every run cleared out by hand or by vacuum, the outlets picked clear, water put down each downpipe until it comes out at the shoe, and the joints and brackets looked at while we are there. You get told what we found and what, if anything, needs more than clearing. The site visit and the written itemised quote cost nothing.
The work
The whole perimeter, not just the front
A single storey house has more gutter per household than most people expect, and all of it is low enough to work on properly.
The whole perimeter, not the front. Spread the same floor area over one storey and you get roughly twice the roof, which means more eaves, more outlets and more downpipes than a two storey house of the same size. Because none of it needs a scaffold, doing the lot in one visit costs very little more than doing one elevation. We start at the far end of each run and work towards the outlet so nothing is pushed into it, bagging as we go rather than dropping it on the border below.
What is actually in a low gutter. Bungalow runs sit close to hedges, shrubs and fences, so as well as roof moss and leaf litter you get clippings, blossom, seed and the grit that washes off the tiles. That mixture holds water and turns into a wet sludge which sets like soil over a winter. It has to be dug out and lifted rather than flushed along the run, because flushing a full gutter simply moves the blockage to the outlet.
Proving it, not just emptying it. Clearing a gutter and walking away tells you nothing. Once each run is empty, water goes in at the far end and we watch it leave: down the outlet, through the swan neck, down the pipe and out at the shoe. That is where a blockage usually is, and it is where an old downpipe running into a gully or a soakaway shows whether the problem is above ground at all.
Falls, brackets and the repairs that follow. Plastic gutter on a long low run needs a bracket about every metre and a steady fall, and a run that has been full for a few winters often has neither. Water standing in the middle of a length is a re-hang: brackets off, line reset, run refixed to a proper fall. A joint that drips once it is moving again gets a new union seal. Anything sagging, split or bowed is photographed and priced on its own line rather than folded into the clean.
Fascias and soffits. On a bungalow the overflow lands about head height, so you can see what it has done. Soft fascia behind the gutter, a stained soffit and green on the brickwork below all get looked at while the ladder is up.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
Same team from first visit to last, one person to ring, and no sub-contracting your work out to somebody you have never met. The quote is itemised, not a figure on the back of a card: access, the length of run, the number of outlets and downpipes, any repair, and where the debris goes on separate lines, so you can compare it properly against anyone else's.
Nothing is left open or unusable overnight. The site is swept at the end of each day rather than the end of the job, and what comes out leaves with us. If something turns up once we start that nobody could have seen, you get a photograph and a price before we carry on.
Nothing about clearing a gutter needs permission and there is nothing for building control to sign off, though new or altered rainwater drainage sits under Approved Document H. Everton has no conservation area, and the handful of listed buildings around the parish are the only ones where changing cast iron rainwater goods for plastic would be a change of appearance needing consent. New Forest District Council is the authority.
Cost
What decides the price of a gutter clean
No rate per square metre, because a metre of gutter behind a conifer and a metre on an open gable are not the same metre.
Getting to it. A single storey run over a flower bed, a chalet bungalow with a dormer breaking the line, and a detached house with a conservatory sitting under one gutter are three different set-ups before anybody starts. A bungalow run comes off a ladder or a pole, a three storey gable wants a tower, and a valley gutter between two roofs wants a proper platform. The work at height rules are why the access is a priced line rather than something absorbed into a rate.
What is in it, and how far it has travelled. Leaf litter lifts out in minutes. Moss washed off the tiles sets into a wet mat that has to be dug out, and silt in a long run behind a hedge is heavier and slower than anything a photograph shows. The number of outlets matters more than the length, because that is where it packs.
Whether it is a clean or a repair. A joint that drips once it is running again, a downpipe blocked at the shoe, a length of plastic that has sagged between brackets: none of that is clearing, and it is the part that decides whether you are booking an hour or half a day.
Comparing quotes? Ask whether the downpipes are being run through or just the gutter cleared, whether the outlets and hoppers are checked, whether it is a clear or a clear and a check for leaks, and who takes the debris away. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.
If it is overflowing now
Water coming over the gutter in heavy rain
Ring rather than use the form. Water running down a wall in a downpour soaks the brickwork and finds its way to a ceiling faster than most people expect, so a blocked outlet in a wet week goes to the front of the queue. We clear it, run water through to prove it, and tell you honestly if what you actually have is a broken joint rather than a blockage. Tell us which corner it is coming over, because on a low roof the water lands straight onto the wall and into the bed at the foot of it. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
On a bungalow the access stops being the problem
Everton is bungalow country by a wide margin, with well over four in ten homes single storey, and that changes the arithmetic of a gutter job rather than the job itself. On a two storey house the access is the expensive part, so people ration it: front this year, back another year, and the awkward run over the garage never at all. Here the access barely registers, because a ladder or a pole reaches everything, so rationing it makes no sense.
The trade off is length. A bungalow gives you a great deal of eaves for the size of the house, and often a garage, a porch and a rear extension each with their own short run and their own outlet. Those little runs are the ones that block, because they are short, nearly flat and usually under something. So the sensible instruction here is the whole perimeter, once a year, everything proved through to the shoe, rather than a bigger job on one elevation.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Everton, Hordle, Milford on Sea, Sway and down into Lymington, broadly SO41, under New Forest District 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.
Questions
Everton questions we get asked
Does a single storey house work out less than one with an upstairs?
The access is, and that is usually the biggest line. The gutter itself is often longer than on a house of the same floor area, so the clearing time is not less. What you save is the tower or the scaffold, which is why doing the whole perimeter here is good value.
There is a conservatory under one of the runs. Can you still get to it?
Yes, and it is one of the reasons we carry a pole and a vacuum. Nobody puts a ladder foot on a conservatory roof. That run is cleared from the ground and the outlet checked from a safe standing point at the end of it.
Our gutters fill with hedge clippings more than leaves. Does that matter?
It matters more, if anything. Clippings and seed pack tighter than leaf litter and hold water like a sponge, so they turn to sludge over a winter and set. They also go straight to the outlet when somebody tries to flush the run instead of lifting it out.
How long does a normal bungalow take?
Most are a morning, including proving every downpipe and looking at the joints. A long perimeter with a garage, a porch and an extension takes longer than the square footage suggests. If it turns into repair work we tell you before we carry on, with a photograph.
Do you carry on through the cold months?
Yes, and a blocked gutter in January is worth dealing with rather than leaving until spring. What we will not do is work off a ladder in a wind, because the guidance on ladder work is clear about that. If the weather is against us we move the day rather than rush it.
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Book the whole perimeter in one go
Thomas comes out, clears every run, proves each downpipe and sends a written itemised quote with any repair shown separately. The visit is free.