Insulation in Wimborne Minster
Loft top-ups on the estates, careful work in the old roofs near the centre, and straight advice on solid walls in the conservation area.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
In the older streets of Wimborne Minster the walls are solid brick with no cavity to fill, so the loft and the draughts are where the money goes first and the walls are a separate decision later. On the estates around the edge of town it is a straight top-up over what is already there.
Three sorts of call come out of this town. An old house near the centre that costs a fortune to heat and where somebody has been told, usually by a doorstep caller, that the walls need filling. A top floor flat that is either roasting or freezing, with a roof space above it that belongs to the building rather than to you. And an ordinary loft that has never been touched since the house was built and is now flat, patchy and cut through with cable runs.
All three start the same way, with somebody up in the roof space with a light and a tape. The site visit is free, the written itemised quote is free with it, and where the honest answer is that your money is better spent on draughts and a hatch than on anything else, that is what you will be told.
The work
The loft above your flat is not yours to insulate
Top-ups on the newer stock. The post-war and eighties housing round the edges of the town has one thin layer between the joists and needs a second across them. We repair what is down, fit vent trays so the eaves stay open, and lay eco roll at right angles over the joists, between and over, to a finished depth of about 270mm, which is what the 0.16 u-value in Approved Document L asks of a renovated roof. Half a day in most houses and nothing has to leave the property.
Nearly a fifth of Wimborne predates 1919 and the largest single group of houses is pre-1900, so a roof in the centre is a cut roof on purlins rather than a modern truss. The loft is a proper space with deep joists, awkward corners and often a lath and plaster ceiling underneath that will not take any weight. Everything is carried in over crawl boards and the wool is cut round the purlin feet rather than jammed under them. These lofts are also where old chimney breasts and the gaps around them lose heat, so the gaps get sealed before the depth goes down.
Flats and the roof space you do not own. A third of the homes in Wimborne are flats, some in purpose built blocks and a lot in older houses that were divided. If you are on the top floor, the loft over your ceiling usually belongs to the freeholder and the hatch is often on the landing rather than inside your flat, so the work needs the freeholder's or managing agent's permission in writing before anybody starts. Where the building pays for the work and it is recharged, section 20 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 sets out the consultation leaseholders are owed. We are happy to quote in a form an agent can put to the other leaseholders.
Older town houses that gained a room in the roof are insulated at rafter level, with rigid PIR board such as Celotex cut tight between and under the rafters, a ventilation gap kept clear above it, and a vapour control layer before boarding. On a dormer cheek or a sloping ceiling where the height is already tight, a multi-layer foil quilt such as TLX gets the performance without stealing the headroom.
Where there is no cavity to fill, the choice is internal wall insulation or external wall insulation, EWI, and in the middle of Wimborne it is nearly always internal. On old brick that build-up has to be breathable rather than sealed tight, or you move the damp instead of curing it. Whatever else we do, the hatch gets boarded and draught sealed, storage decking is lifted and re-laid on legs so the wool is not compressed, the tank and pipework get lagging, and downlighters get covers.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
The quote is itemised: survey, clearing, the material and its depth, ventilation works and disposal on separate lines.
Loft work needs no planning permission anywhere, and nothing you do inside a wall is development. Outside is where Wimborne differs, because the old town is a conservation area, so cladding or rendering an elevation is not automatic here. Planning Portal guidance on external walls and Planning Portal guidance on insulation set out the general position, listed building consent covers a listed building inside as well as out, and Dorset Council holds the conservation area boundary. Building control matters too: regulation 23 of the Building Regulations means renovating more than half of a thermal element brings the whole element up to standard.
Cost
What decides the price of an insulation job
No rate per square metre. A town centre terrace with a small landing hatch, a top floor flat whose roof space is reached from a communal landing, and a semi on the edge of town with the loft boarded out are three different jobs. Old material to bag and take away, and storage to move and put back, come before anything new goes down, and Approved Document L sets what the work has to reach. Comparing quotes, ask what depth is being laid, whether the old material is removed or covered, and whether the hatch and pipework are included.
If it is urgent
Damp, condensation or a room you cannot heat
Ring rather than use the form. Condensation dripping in the loft, mould that keeps coming back, or a room that will not hold heat gets looked at quickly. Insulating a roof space that cannot breathe makes it worse, so the first visit settles which it is. Wimborne is a short run. If it is a flat, have the freeholder or agent details to hand, because that decides how quickly anything is booked.
Worth knowing
What the conservation area stops, and what it does not
The old centre of Wimborne is a conservation area, which controls how the buildings look rather than what you do inside them. It has no bearing on a loft at all: nobody can see it, it changes nothing about the street, and a top-up in a conservation area house is exactly the same job as one anywhere else. The same goes for draught proofing, a sealed hatch, lagging and anything at rafter level that stays behind the plaster. If a doorstep caller has told you that your address rules out insulation, that is wrong.
Where it genuinely bites is the outside face of a solid wall. External insulation changes the proportions of a frontage, the depth of the reveals and the material you see from the street, so on a conservation area elevation it needs checking with the council first, and on a listed building it needs consent even where the work is internal. That is why internal wall insulation is the usual answer in the centre of town.
It is done room by room, best timed for when you were going to redecorate anyway, and it costs you something like the thickness of a book off each outside wall. The details are what make it work: the reveals round the windows, the skirtings, the floor and ceiling junctions and the party wall returns all have to be carried through, or you leave cold bridges exactly where the condensation will show. On old brick the build-up should be a breathable one, not a sealed board, because these walls have always dried outwards and they need to keep doing it.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Wimborne Minster, Merley, Furzehill, Holt and the BH21 addresses out towards Colehill and Broadstone, with Dorset Council for planning and building control. Send the postcode if you want to be sure. 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
Wimborne Minster questions we get asked
Are we allowed to insulate inside the Wimborne Minster conservation area?
You are, in the loft. What the Wimborne Minster Conservation Area governs is appearance, so the things it catches are external: boarding out a front wall, a different covering, a rooflight or a vent on a slope in public view. None of that describes material rolled over a ceiling. If your plan touches the outside face of the building, Dorset should see it before any scaffold goes up.
A third of the town is flats. Can a resident arrange this?
Not on their own. With 33.9% of homes here flats, a great many of the roof voids above top floor properties belong to the freeholder rather than to the flat beneath, and the lease will normally spell that out. The freeholder or the managing agent has to instruct it. Thomas will still come out and look, and the written quote goes in your name so you have something to forward.
Nearly a quarter of homes here are on electric heating. Worth insulating?
More so than on a gas street. 23.0% of households in Wimborne Minster heat with electricity, so every unit of heat that goes up through the ceiling has to be replaced from the meter. The fabric decides how much heat you need and the fuel decides what replacing it means for you. With storage or panel heaters, the loft is usually the biggest single improvement available before you touch the heating.
Our walls are solid brick and pre 1900. Anything worth doing?
Lining from the inside, or nothing at all while you do the loft instead. 18.9% of Wimborne Minster predates 1919 and 17.0% is pre 1900, which means solid walls that dry through their own faces. Foil faced board glued straight on traps moisture in the masonry and it reappears at skirting level. A breathable build up finished in lime suits that fabric, but it eats into the room and the window reveals.
Where does the van sit if we have no off street parking?
On the nearest legal spot, and we carry in from there. The older streets in Wimborne Minster are narrow and many of the terraced houses and flat conversions have no drive at all, so we work in sealed bags rather than blowing anything loose, sheet the hallway, and load out in one run at the end. If a permit or a bay suspension is needed, that gets arranged before the day.
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Ask us before you agree to anything
Free site visit anywhere in Wimborne, and a written itemised quote that shows the depth, the ventilation work and any wall work as separate lines.