Loft insulation in Corfe Mullen
Full depth back over the ceiling, your storage kept, and an itemised written price before anything is ordered.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
Nearly every loft in Corfe Mullen already has something in it, and the job is almost always to straighten that, close the edges and cross lay a fresh layer over the joists to a finished 270mm rather than start again.
People ring for one of three reasons. The bedrooms are cold and the heating bill says so. They have been up in the loft for something and noticed the insulation is thin, flat and stops well short of the walls. Or a board has come up and the wool underneath is squashed to nothing. Most of the housing here went up between the war and the early eighties, so the roofs are much of an age and much of a type, and the same handful of faults come up again and again. We look at yours before we price it. The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote.
The work
Straightening a loft that was done once already
Getting the old material honest again. A layer laid decades ago has settled, dipped between the joists and pulled apart at the joins, and there are usually bare runs where a cable or an aerial lead was pulled through. If it is dry we straighten it, close the gaps and keep it. If it is wet, crushed flat or contaminated with droppings, it is bagged and taken away first. Nothing new goes on top of something that should have come out.
Two layers, and why the second one matters. The first layer sits between the joists, friction fitted rather than rammed in. The second is laid across the joists at right angles to bring the finished depth to 270mm, and that is the layer that stops the timber itself acting as a cold bridge straight through the ceiling. Mineral wool, glass wool or rockwool in a roll suits most lofts; batts help at odd centres and loose fill goes where you cannot crawl.
Where headroom or shape gets in the way. A shallow trussed roof, a boxed in landing or a low eaves run will not take a roll. Rigid board, PIR such as Celotex, cut tight, does more in less depth. Where a sloping ceiling, a dormer or a room in the roof is involved the work follows the rafters instead, with a clear gap kept above the board to the underlay and joints taped so vapour is not pushed into the timber.
The eaves have to stay open. Insulation stops at the wall plate. Push it into the eaves and the air stops crossing the loft, and a warm bedroom is bought with a wet roof. We hold the gap with vent trays, check that cross ventilation actually works, and where a roof has been re-covered on breathable membrane rather than old felt we say what that changes. A ridge vent is the answer where the eaves cannot be opened up.
The services up there. Once the ceiling is insulated the loft is a cold space, so a cold water tank and its pipework need lagging, the tank on the sides and top and never underneath. Cables get lifted and clipped over rather than buried, since wiring that cannot lose heat carries less current. Recessed lights and downlighters need fire rated covers, and the hatch gets insulated on the back and draught sealed round the frame.
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: the survey, clearing and bagging whatever is up there now, the material and its depth, keeping the eaves clear, the hatch and any pipework, and disposal 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.
Insulation inside a loft is not development and needs no planning application, which Planning Portal guidance on insulation sets out plainly. There is no conservation area over Corfe Mullen and almost nothing listed, so for an ordinary house here there is nothing to apply for at all. The standard the work reaches is set by Approved Document L, with Dorset Council for building control, and HMRC VAT Notice 708/6 covers the VAT treatment.
Cost
What decides the price of a loft
No rate per square metre, because the floor area is the easy part and the awkward edges are where the time goes.
Getting to it. A bungalow with a wide landing hatch, a chalet where half the roof is already a room, and a semi with a boarded loft full of storage are three different jobs. A hatch on a landing you can stand a ladder under is one job. A hatch over a stairwell, a crawl space you can only move through on your knees, or a loft full of boarding that has to come up and go back, is time before any material is laid.
What is up there now, and what it is sitting on. Old material that has to come out, be bagged and taken away is a cost before anything new goes down, and so is a loft full of boxes that has to be emptied and put back. Joists at 400 centres with a flat run across them is a different afternoon from a trussed roof full of bracing.
Ventilation, and the edges nobody reaches. Insulation stops at the wall plate and the eaves have to stay clear, or you trade a warm bedroom for a wet roof. Getting depth right into the corners and around the hatch, boxing over downlighters and lagging anything that now sits in the cold, is most of the labour. Approved Document L sets what the work is expected to reach.
Comparing quotes? Ask what depth is actually being laid and in how many layers, whether the old material is coming out or being covered over, whether the eaves are being kept clear, what happens to anything you store up there, and whether the hatch and the pipework are included. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.
If the loft is wet
Water running off the felt, or mould on the underside
Ring rather than use the form. Droplets on the underside of the felt, black mould spreading across the roof timbers, or insulation that is visibly damp are all telling you the same thing: warm wet air is getting into a space that cannot breathe. That does not wait, because it is the timbers that pay for it. We look before anything is added, because putting more insulation into a loft that cannot ventilate makes it worse. If a bathroom or kitchen fan up here vents into the roof space instead of out through the tiles, that is usually the whole problem and it is quick to put right. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
The boards over your ceiling are probably crushing the insulation
The thing that shapes almost every quote we write in Corfe Mullen is boarding. These are family houses on estates with garages and lofts, and over the years most of them have had chipboard sheets laid straight across the ceiling joists to make a store. That looks tidy and it quietly ruins the insulation, because a joist is only so deep and the boards squash whatever is under them down to a fraction of its depth. A crushed layer is not insulation, it is a filled gap.
The fix is not to give up your storage. It is to lift the boards, get the full depth back in and then rebuild the floor on loft legs so the boards sit above the second layer rather than on it. People are often surprised how small the boarded area actually needs to be once it is planned rather than grown. We measure it at the visit, price the raised floor as its own line, and you decide whether you want it before anything is ordered.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Corfe Mullen, Broadstone, Beacon Hill, Wimborne Minster, Upton and Merley in the BH21 postcodes, with Dorset Council for planning and building control. 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
Corfe Mullen questions we get asked
How long does it take?
A day covers most houses here. Where a boarded loft has to be emptied, the boards lifted and a raised floor rebuilt, allow two. You are told which at the visit, not once we have started.
Can we keep using the loft for storage?
Yes, with loft legs and a raised floor over the area you actually use. Boards resting on the joists flatten the wool underneath and waste the money, so we lift the boards, lay full depth and put the floor back higher.
There is already insulation up there. Why add more?
Because it has settled, and because the depth expected has moved. A thin flat layer leaves the U value of that ceiling well short of what Part L asks for now. Cross laying new material over the old is cheaper than clearing it out and starting again.
Will a warmer house up here mean more condensation?
Not while the eaves stay open. What changes is the temperature of the roof space, and a colder roof space condenses moisture the house is producing anyway. Trays at the eaves and a sealed hatch keep that off the timbers.
Is there anything to apply for?
No. There is no conservation area here and next to nothing listed, so loft insulation on an ordinary Corfe Mullen house is simply work you can have done. Building control sets the standard, not a planning officer.
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Find out what is under your loft boards
Thomas lifts a board, measures what is actually there and prices the loft line by line. The visit and the quote are free.