Insulation in Branksome
Lofts, attic rooms, walls and the cold timber floors under older houses, looked at together so the money goes where it counts.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
Last updated
Insulation in Branksome starts with the house. An Edwardian house usually needs its loft topped up, a solid wall lined and a draughty timber floor dealt with; a later semi or bungalow is more often a loft and a cavity question. We look at all of it and tell you which part will make the biggest difference first.
Branksome houses lose heat through suspended floors, thin lofts and attic rooms, and a poor EPC often says so. A cold front room over a suspended floor with a draught coming up through the boards. A loft with a thin, flattened layer that has been there since before they moved in. An attic room or a top floor flat that bakes in summer and freezes in winter. Or a house bought with a poor EPC that they want to bring up before the heating bill arrives.
We come out, go up into the loft, lift a board or look through an air brick, and give you an itemised written quote. The detail for each part sits on its own page: loft insulation in Branksome and wall insulation in Branksome.
The work
Roofs, attic rooms, walls and old floors
Lofts. The first place to insulate and usually the best value. Mineral wool roll is laid between the joists, then a second layer across them, between and over, to a total depth of about 270mm.
In a Branksome loft, an old 100mm layer that is dry and even can stay, with a top-up over it; compressed or settled material comes out and is bagged. Eco roll suits a loft you will go into, because it is less itchy to handle. The eaves are kept clear with a vent tray at each rafter, the tank and pipework are lagged, downlighters get covers, and the hatch is insulated and sealed. If you want storage, boarding goes on raised legs so the depth underneath is kept.
Rooms in the roof and sloping ceilings. Where there is no loft floor, rigid board goes between and under the rafters. Celotex and other PIR boards give the most for the depth. A multi-layer foil such as TLX can help where space is really tight, used alongside board rather than instead of it. An air gap is kept above for ventilation, and a vapour control layer goes on the warm side before plasterboard so condensation cannot build up in the roof.
Walls. Later Branksome houses with a cavity wall may be suitable for fill, which is blown in by a registered specialist installer; we check the wall first and do the repairs it depends on. Solid walls in the older houses are lined inside with insulated board or insulated from outside with EWI. Either way the wall page sets out how.
Suspended timber floors. Many older houses in Branksome have a void under the boards. Where it is deep enough, insulation goes between the joists from below. Otherwise the boards come up room by room, mineral wool goes in on netting between the joists, and the gaps at the skirting are sealed. The air bricks stay open.
Draughts and cold bridges. Gaps around the loft hatch, along skirting boards and at old service holes lose as much heat as a missing layer in some houses. They are cheap to close and are on every quote where we find them.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
One person to ring from the first visit to the last. The quote is itemised, not a figure on the back of a card: the survey, clearing what is there, the material and its depth, ventilation works and disposal on separate lines, so you can compare it properly against anyone else's.
Nothing in a Branksome house 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.
Insulating a loft or a floor inside the house needs no planning permission or permitted development right, as the Planning Portal guidance on insulation explains. Renovating more than half of a roof or a wall brings in building control under regulation 23, and the work has to reach Approved Document L: 0.16 at a loft ceiling and 0.18 at the rafters. Insulation in a home is zero rated for VAT until 31 March 2027 under HMRC VAT Notice 708/6, and we are not VAT registered, so there is no VAT on our quote either way.
Cost
What decides the price of an insulation job
No rate per square metre, because the area is the easy part and the awkward part is everything around it.
Getting to it. A loft in a 1970s semi you can stand up in, a low bungalow roof worked on a crawl, and an attic room in an Edwardian house near Brunstead Road with sloping ceilings are each priced on their own terms. A loft hatch you can stand a ladder under is one job, a crawl space or a room in the roof is another. Where boarding has to come up and go back, that is time before any material is laid.
What is already up there. Old material that has to come out, and be bagged and taken away, is a cost before anything new goes down. So is anything stored in the loft that has to be moved and put back.
Ventilation and the awkward edges. Eaves that must stay clear, downlighters that need covers, a tank and pipework that still need lagging, and getting depth right into the corners rather than just across the middle. Approved Document L sets what the work is expected to reach.
Comparing quotes? Ask what depth is actually being laid, whether the old material is being removed or covered, whether the eaves are being kept clear, and whether the hatch and the pipework are included.
If it is urgent
Damp, condensation or a room you cannot heat
Ring rather than use the form. Insulation is rarely an emergency, but a loft dripping with condensation, black mould coming back faster than you can wash it off, or a room that will not hold heat before a cold snap all get looked at quickly.
The first visit is about finding out whether the problem is insulation, ventilation or both, because insulating a roof space that cannot breathe makes it worse. In a converted house, damp on a top floor ceiling can come from the roof above as easily as from condensation, so tell us which floor you are on when you ring. Scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. For anything urgent, ring rather than use the form, and if we cannot pick up we ring you back as soon as we can.
The one local thing
Cold floors in the older Branksome houses
A good share of Branksome was built around 1900 and in the years before the Second World War, and houses of that age were usually built with suspended timber ground floors. The boards sit on joists over an open void, kept dry by air bricks in the outside wall. Cold air moves through that void all the time, which is why a front room in one of these houses can feel chilly at ankle height even with the loft done.
Insulating the floor helps a lot, but it has to leave the void ventilated. So we never block an air brick, never lay anything that sits on the ground under the house, and keep the insulation between the joists with a breathable membrane on top. At the visit we look through an air brick or lift a board to see how deep the void is and whether the joist ends are dry. If they are damp, or the air bricks are buried by a raised path or patio outside, that is sorted first, because insulating over a damp floor only traps the problem.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We insulate homes across Branksome, BH12, from Poole Road and the station up to Alder Road and the Bourne Valley, and next door in Parkstone, Westbourne and Branksome Park. Building control is BCP 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. Before you book a visit in Branksome, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.
Planning at a glance
Do you need planning permission in Branksome?
Most repairs in Branksome 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.
| Question | In Branksome |
|---|---|
| Who decides | BCP Council is the planning authority for Branksome. BCP Council's heritage pages set out what it controls. |
| Conservation area | Yes: Brunstead Road Conservation Area. Check whether your street is inside the boundary before changing anything visible. |
| Listed buildings | Yes, there are listed buildings in and around Branksome. If yours is one, work can need listed building consent. |
| Protected landscape | No National Park or National Landscape covers Branksome. |
Questions
Questions about insulation in Branksome
Which should I do first: loft, walls or floor?
Almost always the loft, because it is the quickest and loses the most heat. Then draughts and the floor in an older house, and the walls last, because they are the biggest job.
How deep should loft insulation be?
About 270mm of mineral wool, laid in two layers with the top one across the joists. That gets a loft ceiling to 0.16, which is what Approved Document L asks for.
Is there VAT on insulation?
Not on our quote, because we are not VAT registered. VAT registered firms zero rate insulation in a home until 31 March 2027.
Can you insulate under the floorboards without ruining the floor?
Yes. Where we can get underneath we work from below. Otherwise the boards come up a room at a time and go back down, and the air bricks are kept clear.
Nearby, and next door
Insulation near Branksome
Nearby places we also cover for insulation, with straight-line distances from Branksome, and the other trades we offer in Branksome itself.
Insulation nearby
Our other trades in Branksome
Insulation guides
Part L: do you have to insulate when you re-roof? Black mould on walls: what causes it and what stops it PIR board vs mineral wool: which insulation?Everything we do in Branksome Insulation, all areas Every area we cover
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Find out where your house loses heat
Thomas comes out, goes up into the loft, checks the walls and the floor, and prices it in writing. The visit and the quote are free.