Insulation in Lover
Loft top-ups, flue clearances done properly, and warm roof work in converted outbuildings, surveyed before it is priced.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
For most houses around Lover the fix is a second layer of quilt laid across the joists and the eaves left properly open, not a bigger job than that. What decides it is what is already up there and what else is sharing the roof space with it, which is what the free site visit is for.
The three calls we get from this end of the parish are much the same. A cottage that eats fuel and still has one cold room. A loft that has been opened up and found to be a mess, with quilt dragged about, droppings in it and daylight at the eaves. And a converted outbuilding or annexe that is fine in September and unusable in February.
Each of those is a different job and none of them is diagnosed from the doorstep. We get into the roof space and look at what is there: how deep the layer measures once a rule goes into it, whether it is dry, whether the eaves are open or stuffed shut, what is passing through the space, and what the ceiling below is made of.
Then we tell you plainly which parts are worth doing and which are not, and put a written itemised quote in front of you with the method on it as well as the number. Nothing is ordered until you have said yes to it.
The work
Nothing gets packed against the flue
Topping up a loft in an older cottage. Better than a quarter of the housing around Lover predates 1919, and those roofs are mostly cut timber rather than trusses, which makes them easier to work in and easier to get wrong, because the joists are shallow and irregular. Filling between them alone leaves every timber bridging the cold. It goes in between and over: mineral wool eco roll between the joists, a second run at right angles across the top, roughly 270mm all told, which is what brings a ceiling to the u-value of about 0.16 that Approved Document L expects when a roof is renovated.
Nothing gets packed against the flue. A great many houses out here have a wood burner or a solid fuel stove, and the flue passes straight through the loft. Insulation cannot be packed against a twin wall flue or a chimney breast: the clearance the flue was installed with has to be kept, and the way to do that is a rigid non combustible collar holding the quilt back rather than a gap left in the layer around it. It is a small detail that is missed constantly, and it is one of the first things we look at when we get up there.
Rural roof spaces get visitors. Mice, squirrels and birds drag quilt into nests, flatten it and foul it, and once that has happened the material has to come out and be bagged rather than covered over. While the loft is clear we find where they are getting in and close it at the verge or the eaves without closing the ventilation. Half the buildings turned into rooms out here were never built to hold heat at all: a single skin wall, a sheet roof and a concrete floor need rigid board on the walls, a warm roof build-up in PIR over the deck, and honest talk about ventilation before anything is sealed up. Where a ceiling follows the roof and there is no head height to give away, a multi-layer foil quilt such as TLX does what a thick board cannot, taped so the vapour control layer stays continuous.
The older cottages are solid wall with no cavity to fill, so it is internal wall insulation on the room face, built to breathe, or external wall insulation on the outside, which inside the National Park is a planning question before it is a technical one. The post-war houses and bungalows do have cavities, and we borescope them before anyone quotes a fill rather than assuming either way. Then the practical bits: an insulated, draughtproofed hatch, fire rated covers over downlighters, lagging on the cold water tank and every pipe run left above the new layer, and a boarded deck on legs where you want storage back.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
One team, one person to ring, nothing sub-contracted out. The quote is itemised line by line: survey, clearing, material and depth, ventilation and disposal. What comes out leaves with us. Insulating a loft or lining a wall internally is an improvement rather than development, so no planning permission is needed, as the Planning Portal's insulation guidance sets out. Building control comes in when a thermal element is renovated, or when an outbuilding becomes a room. The outside is different: inside the National Park boundary the Authority is the planning authority, its heritage and conservation team takes an interest in anything that changes how a building reads, and building control runs through New Forest District Council.
Cost
What decides the price of an insulation job
We do not price this by the square metre. The area is the easy part and the awkward part is everything around it. A forest cottage with a small hatch and low eaves, a bungalow with a hipped roof that closes down at all four corners, and a converted outbuilding with no loft at all are three different days before any material is bought. Fouled or wet material has to be bagged and taken away first. Approved Document L sets what the work is expected to reach. Ask what finished depth is being laid, and whether the flue clearance and the pipe lagging are itemised.
If it is urgent
Damp, condensation or a room you cannot heat
Ring rather than use the form. A loft dripping with condensation, or a room that will not hold heat before a cold snap, gets looked at quickly. Lover is at the top end of our patch, so you will get a straight answer on the phone about which day we can be there rather than a promised hour we would miss. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
The National Park changes the outside, not the loft
The National Park boundary runs close by here, and it is not obvious from the road which side of it a given house sits on. It matters less than people fear. Everything that happens above your ceiling or on the room face of a wall is invisible from outside and is not a planning matter at all, so loft work, draughtproofing, pipe lagging and internal linings are unaffected by the designation.
What the Park does look closely at is anything that changes how a building reads: external wall insulation, which alters the face of the wall, the depth of every window reveal and the overhang at the eaves, and any rooflight or dormer added to get light into a converted attic. The Authority's interactive property map will tell you in a minute whether you are inside the boundary, and it is worth checking before you plan anything external rather than after.
The practical consequence for a cold stone or solid brick cottage out here is that the sensible route is usually the inside one: get the loft right, seal the draughts, then look at internal wall insulation on the coldest elevations. That has its own rules.
The build-up has to let the wall keep drying, the cold bridge at the joist ends and the window reveals has to be dealt with, you lose a little floor area, and the room needs enough ventilation afterwards. Any quote that offers to line a solid wall with a sealed plastic board and says nothing about breathability or about the reveals is quoting a different job from the one your house needs.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Lover, Redlynch, Morgan's Vale, Woodfalls and Nomansland on SP5, out through Downton and Fordingbridge, and the New Forest National Park Authority is the planning authority for addresses inside the boundary. 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
Lover questions we get asked
Is there a conservation area over Lover?
There is not one covering Lover. The New Forest National Park Authority is still the planning authority here rather than the district council, and it looks at anything visible: a change of covering, a rooflight, vent tiles on a front slope. Work inside the roof is none of its business. There are 8 listed entries in the area and only those houses need consent before ceilings or linings are touched.
Our ceilings are lath and plaster. Will they carry it?
They will carry loose quilt but nothing heavy, and they must never be walked on. Over a quarter of Lover predates 1919, and in those houses the ceiling is lime plaster on timber laths held up by nothing more than the keys squeezed through the gaps. I work off boards spanning the joists and lay material by hand from the edge of the board rather than kneeling between them.
We have a bungalow with a big roof. Where is the loss?
Through the ceiling mostly, and out at the perimeter. Around 30% of homes in Lover are bungalows and 42% are detached, which means large single storey roofs standing on their own with wind getting at every side. Material that stops a foot short of the wall plate leaves a cold ring right round the building, and that shows up as black mould in the corners of the rooms below.
Which houses in Lover are usually the worst?
The two extremes, for opposite reasons. The pre 1900 cottages have solid walls and open chimneys, while the post war houses, about 45% of the stock, have thin original ceiling layers and unsealed hatches. What they share is that none of it was built to be airtight. I look at chimneys, hatches and eaves before anything else, because those three account for most of the draught.
Would you work on this through the winter?
Yes, and a cold spell is the best time to see what is wrong. Lover sits on ground that holds water and the roof spaces get properly cold, so in January you can feel where the draughts come through and see where frost melts off the slope in patches. Roof work is inside and dry, so weather stops nothing. Wall linings I would rather do in a settled stretch.
Nearby, and next door
Insulation near Lover
Insulation nearby
Our other trades in Lover
Everything we do in Ringwood Insulation, all areas Every area we cover
Free quote
Have a look in the loft first
A free site visit around Lover and Redlynch, a rule in whatever is up there now, and a written itemised quote with the method on it as well as the number.