Gutter cleaning at Walhampton and Portmore
Runs cleared by hand, downpipes proved with water, and a plain note of which parts of the rainwater system you can instruct and which the freeholder owns.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
Rainwater across the water from Lymington
Work out who owns the gutter before you book anybody
Ask one question before you get quotes: is the gutter yours? Close to a third of the dwellings here are flats or maisonettes, and on a flat the gutters, the downpipes and the roof belong to the freeholder rather than to you.
That splits the calls we get into two kinds. A house owner rings because water is sheeting off the front edge in a downpour, or because a joint has been dripping onto a path all winter. A leaseholder rings because a downpipe has been overflowing onto their balcony or their patio for two years and nothing has been done about it, and they want somebody to actually turn up.
The work is the same either way. What differs is who signs. On the free site visit we look at every run, outlet, hopper and downpipe on the building and tell you straight which of it you can authorise on your own. The written quote is itemised, and where a property is in shared ownership we price the communal runs and the private ones on separate lines so everybody can see what belongs to whom.
The jobs
Long lane frontages, big roofs in grounds, and blocks with the pipes inside
Clearing, then proving it. Out by hand into a bucket where there is safe standing, with a scoop for the silt and moss that packs into the bottom as sludge, or on a gutter vacuum with a camera on the reach pole where a ladder would be footed on soft ground. It is bagged and goes with us. Then each downpipe is flushed and the run proved with water at the shoe. Clearing without proving it is guesswork.
Houses in grounds. A quarter of the dwellings here are detached and many sit in their own trees, which means long runs, a lot of leaf and a lot of small twig. Twig is the awkward one: it bridges an outlet and then catches everything else, so a run can be almost clean and still not drain. On a big spread of roof we check the fall along each length while it is empty, because a long gutter that has settled anywhere in the middle will hold water even once the debris is gone.
Blocks and converted houses. Where flats are involved the rainwater rarely leaves by a simple eaves gutter and a pipe on the outside. It goes into hoppers, down internal or boxed in pipes, and out at a gully somebody has planted over. Nobody sees the failure until a ceiling stains on the top floor. We clear the runs, check the hoppers, rod what we can reach and photograph anything already rotted or split so the agent has something to act on.
Valley and box gutters. Where two pitches meet, the valley gutter takes everything both slopes shed to one point. Under trees they silt up fast, and a blocked valley backs up under the tiles rather than over an edge. Cleared by hand, with the lead looked over at the same time.
Repairs found on the way. A dripping union that wants a new seal, a length sagging between brackets, a bracket that has pulled out of a fascia gone soft under a leak, a downpipe swinging off the wall on a broken clip and staining the brickwork behind it. We refix, realign or re-hang where that answers it, and price replacement separately when it does not.
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.
Clearing and repairing rainwater goods needs nobody's permission and building control has no interest in it. Two things around it do matter. Walhampton and Portmore sit inside the Forest South East conservation area and there are 93 listed entries nearby, so replacing cast iron with plastic on a visible elevation is a planning question rather than maintenance, and the National Park keeps the boundaries. In a block, the freeholder's consent comes before ours.
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 lane frontage cottage, a detached house standing in its own grounds and a three storey block with parking underneath are three different jobs before anyone lifts a bucket. 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. If you are a leaseholder and the overflow is coming off a communal run, ring anyway and we will tell you who needs to instruct it, because that conversation takes longer than the work does. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
On a flat, the gutter is not yours to book
Around 31% of the dwellings here are flats or maisonettes, which is high for a place this rural, and it changes who you should be ringing. If you are a leaseholder, the roof, the outside walls, the gutters, the hoppers and the downpipes are almost always retained by the freeholder and maintained out of the service charge you already pay. You cannot instruct a contractor to work on them, however badly they need it.
What catches people out is that a gutter clean feels too small to need permission. It does not feel like a roof job. But the run over your window is the same run that goes over your neighbour's, and the pipe it feeds is shared, so there is no way to do your share of it. The route that works is to get the block onto the agent's maintenance list and ask that we are invited to price it. We quote to freeholders, management companies and residents associations, break the communal runs out from anything genuinely private, and put the survey photographs in with the quote. If you own a house here, none of that applies and you can just book it.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Walhampton, Portmore, Boldre, Lymington and the villages either side of the river, broadly SO41, under the New Forest National Park Authority. 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
Walhampton and Portmore questions we get asked
Can the managing agent get one price for the whole block?
Yes, and it is often the only way a block gets sorted. We price the communal runs and any private balcony drainage separately, put photographs of each elevation in with the quote, and give a date rather than a window so residents can be told.
There are trees right over our roof. How often will it need doing?
Twice a year under mature broadleaf: one clear after the leaves are down and one in spring. Small twig drives that frequency as much as leaf does, because it bridges the outlet and holds everything else back. We will say on the visit whether an annual clear would do.
Can you get a ladder in on soft ground?
Sometimes not, and we will not pretend otherwise. A lawn or a border in winter is no place for a ladder footing, so those runs come off the vacuum and reach pole from a hard standing, or off a tower where the job needs hands on the gutter.
Our downpipe just disappears into the ground. Where does it go?
Usually to a soakaway or an old land drain rather than a public sewer, which is normal out here. It also means the fault is often below ground rather than in the gutter. We prove the run with water and tell you if what you have is a full soakaway.
Is a valley gutter part of a normal clean?
It is on ours, where there is one and we can reach it safely. It is the one people forget, because you cannot see it from the ground, and it does not overflow tidily over an edge. It backs up under the tiles and comes out as damp on a ceiling.
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Get every run, hopper and downpipe checked in one visit
Thomas comes out, works round the whole building, and sends a written itemised quote with the clearing, any repair and anything communal on separate lines. Free.