As we enter March, we begin to see our neighbors outside inspecting their yard and home looking for what needs to be renewed, repaired, replaced or cleaned after a long harsh winter.
With this the home improvement stores start buzzing again and the sound of yard maintenance usually signal that spring has arrived. The usual sales for fertilizer and deck sealants abound, as homeowners know the importance of getting an early start on their lawns to prevent weeds, and to seal the deck to prevent major damage from the rain and snow. What most homeowners don’t know is that one of the most important items to be maintained this time of year will require them to look up at the rain gutters.
While you walk around your lawn picking up branches and raking leaves that fell from winter wind gust and snow, remember if it landed on the ground it probably also landed on your roof and in your gutters. Failure to keep your gutters functioning will cause the same damage to your roof and fascia wood that rain and snow will cause to your deck if not properly maintained. If you would not wait until late spring to start your lawn care, why would you wait to maintain your gutters?
So even if you had your gutters cleaned in the fall, early spring is the time to get the first cleaning and inspection of your rain gutters, to protect your home from the damaging effects of water. Call The Gutter Guys for a fast free estimate to get your gutters cleaned and inspected.
For a fast free estimate contact us or call 1-800-GUTTER-1.
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I have previously written about when you should have your rain gutters cleaned and who should clean your gutters. The previous post were an introduction and summarized the topic of gutter maintenance, in this post I will go into more detail on how to hire a company that knows how to do the job right, identify the risks of hiring the wrong company, and minimize your exposure to an unqualified contractor working on your home.
Risk of hiring an unqualified Gutter Cleaning Company
You may say to yourself “They are only cleaning my gutters, what risk could I have? If you hire an unqualified company there is a lot of risk. If the company you hire is not insured to be on your roof and or be on ladders, and their “employee” gets hurt while working on your home you could be legally liable for his medical expenses and if there are permanent injuries or worse, you could be liable for future compensation. See Legal Match article. The other exposure is if the contractor does not carry adequate general liability insurance and causes damage to your property or your neighbor’s property. How can this happen? Murphy’s Law, ladder leaning on home, ladder falls hits car, window, fence, patio furniture, neighbor’s house, etc.. Ladder comes into contact with electrical wire, starts fire. While these situations do not happen often, they do happen and if your Gutter Cleaning Company does not have general liability insurance you can and will be liable for the damages.
The next item you should check is to see if the company you hire is licensed in the state where the work will be done. I say it that way because often a contractor may be licensed in one state and not licensed in an neighboring state. Quite often contractors will work in states that they are not licensed in, each state requirements for licensing is different, and often any protections the customer may have by hiring a licensed contractor is lost if the work is not being done in the state that issued the license.
What is the expertise, motivation of the company doing the work? Roofers, siding, window and landscaping companies offer gutter cleaning as a service their company provides. It is not in your best interest to hire a company that is not a full services gutter company. Landscapers often offer it as part of the fall clean up of the yard debris, it can help extend the seasonality of their business. However, they are rarely insured to be on ladders or roofs. Roofers, siding and window contractors usually use gutter cleaning promotions as a method of inspecting your property for the work they really want to do, new roof, window and siding installations. Will any of these companies know if your gutters have other problems besides being clogged? Will they be able to tell if your gutters are properly pitched, secured, or in need of replacement?
The company reputation for service is important. Do they answer the phone when you call them? Are they open year round? How long have they been in business? I know you are thinking it is only a gutter cleaning. What you have to start thinking is that the company you hire to clean your gutters is really working on your “HOME”! Do not hire a company that will but your home at risk, either from not doing the job right and you suffer damage to your property because the gutters overflow and you suffer water damage or hiring a company that is not adequately insured or licensed.
To protect yourself and your “HOME” before you hire a company to clean your gutters below is a check list:
Get a copy of the certificate of insurance showing that they are insured to work on ladders and that the coverage includes both liability and workers compensation. And if they use subcontractors you will need to get copies from both the contractor and the subcontractor
Check with state regulatory authority for proper license and registration
If doing gutter work is not prominently displayed as part of the services they provide, on their vehicles, uniforms, or business cards, they are not a full service gutter company
Customer service, hire a professional company that has been around, you have seen working in your neighborhood
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As autumn begins the season for gutter maintenance and protection goes in to fast motion. Some homeowners want their gutters cleaned every month, others want to wait until the last leaf has fallen. While any frequency of maintaining your gutters is better than not maintaining your gutters at all, there are now products that claim to eliminate this chore. As there are hundreds of products and names for the various types of gutter protection in the market, most review sites focus on the design or material they are made of to compare the products and usually focus on 4 to 6 designs; screens, filters, helmet type, brushes and foam are common descriptions of products. I believe that most of these can be combined in to two types but will add a third louvered for our descriptions and opinion. The most important feature to look for in a product is design, will the design function in such a way that allows the rain water in to the gutter while keeping the gutters and the gutter protection from getting clogged. The material the gutter protection is made of will determine how durable a product is; remember durable material will not make a poor design work. So many products made from the same material, i.e.; aluminum will not function the same way.
Screens/Filters/Foam and Mesh
This category includes brushes, foam, mesh, screens and filters. While they may not look similar and are designed from different materials such as plastic, aluminum, stainless steel and nylon, they have the same flaw. The common principle in all these designs is that they claim to keep debris out of the gutter by various method of having holes small enough that debris will not pass through. The flaw in this category is that the holes in the gutter protection will get clogged which will prevent water from getting in to the gutter and cause the same problems as clogged gutter. There is no way to tell how long it will take for the holes to get filled, but the smaller the hole (foam, filters and mesh) usually the quicker it will clog, as some small debris that would normally wash down the downspout such as pollen dust or shingle granular can and will get caught in the filters, foams and mesh. As the holes get bigger (screens and brush) they allow the small debris through until the bigger debris, leaves and leaf particles clog the holes. Some of these products claim to be made from space age technologies that allow them to not get clogged, it is my belief that if air will clog your air filter in your car or home, and clean water will clog a water filter in your refrigerator, eventually all filters will clog.
So instead of a clogged gutter you have a clogged screen, filter or foam gutter system. This category may reduce the frequency of maintenance in the beginning but should be considered a temporary solution.
Helmet Like
This category may additionally be called; horizontal opening, nose forward, covers or helmet like. The design of the products in this category is very similar as many of them are spin offs from products no longer protected by U.S. patents. Although they look similar, they are made from different materials, usually aluminum, plastic or vinyl. There are some design variations, i.e.; seamless covers, double reverse curves and a combination screen and reverse curve. The design principle for this category is that (liquid) water will adhere to a solid surface and solid debris will not. So as the rain water comes off your roof it will adhere to the gutter cover with a reverse curve at the front of the gutter and drop into the gutter following the reverse curve. The physics of this design is accurate for the rain water. Unfortunately, it is inaccurate for the debris floating in the water.
While dry debris does not have the surface adhesion properties as rain water, the debris floating in the rain often will not separate at the point of the reverse curve, and will float with the water into the gutter. As this debris flows toward the downspout you have the beginning of a clogged gutter. Once again there is no way to determine how long it will take for a clog to occur, but when the clog occurs there often is no easy way to clean the system short of removal.
Louvered/GutterGard
This category starts with a design principle of surface adhesion similar to the reverse curve, but replaces the horizontal opening with staggered louvered openings that have a similar volume opening allowing the rain water to flow to the gutter and keeping floating debris large enough to clog your downspout out. This design is made from copper or 25 colors of aluminum to match your roof or existing gutters to insure its durability.
While some products claim they are maintenance free, there is no such product out there in gutter protection or anything else. This design will handle all the rain, and in the event that pollen or leaves were to block a louver you can safely and easily brush the debris away. If your objectives in gutter protection are to keep your gutters clog free and to safely maintain your gutters from the ground, GutterGard is the product that will permanently solve your gutter maintenance needs.
For a fast free estimate contact us or call 1-800-GUTTER-1.
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Established in 1988, The Gutter Guys is a full service rain gutter company. We have over 300,000 happy customers with many of them right here in Elkton, Maryland. Just as Elkton residents take pride in its Union Hospital, an award-winning not-for-profit community hospital nationally acknowledged for its clinical superiority, The Gutter Guys proudly service and install rain gutters, gutter guards, seamless gutters and offer gutter cleaning and gutter repairs for homes and businesses in and around Elkton, MD .
Established in 1988, The Gutter Guys is a full service rain gutter company. We have over 300,000 happy customers with many of them right here in Perryville, Maryland. Just as Perryville residents take pride in being home to the historic hotel, Rodgers Tavern (also known as Stevenson’s Tavern), where George Washington preferred to stay when on travel from Virginia to New York during the years 1755 to 1798, The Gutter Guys proudly service and install rain gutters, gutter guards, seamless gutters and offer gutter cleaning and gutter repairs for homes and businesses in and around Perryville, MD .
Established in 1988, The Gutter Guys is a full service rain gutter company. We have over 300,000 happy customers with many of them right here in Parkville, Maryland. Just as Parkville residents take pride in being home to one of the most reputable schools, Parkville Middle and Center of Technology, a school zoned for Parkville and also a magnet school for students from all across Baltimore County, The Gutter Guys proudly service and install rain gutters, gutter guards, seamless gutters and offer gutter cleaning and gutter repairs for homes and businesses in and around Parkville, MD .
Established in 1988, The Gutter Guys is a full service rain gutter company. We have over 300,000 happy customers with many of them right here in Aberdeen, Maryland. Just as Aberdeen residents take pride of being the “Gateway to the Chesapeake Bay”, and home of the famous Ripken Stadium and of the historic United States Army facility the Aberdeen Proving Ground (APG), The Gutter Guys proudly service and install rain gutters, gutter guards, seamless gutters and offer gutter cleaning and gutter repairs for homes and businesses in and around Aberdeen, MD .
Established in 1988, The Gutter Guys is a full service rain gutter company. We have over 300,000 happy customers with many of them right here in Edgewood, Maryland. Just as Edgewood residents take pride in the historic landmark Pooles Island Light which is the oldest lighthouse in Maryland and now operational using solar energy, The Gutter Guys proudly service and install rain gutters, gutter guards, seamless gutters and offer gutter cleaning and gutter repairs for homes and businesses in and around Edgewood, MD .
Established in 1988, The Gutter Guys is a full service rain gutter company. We have over 300,000 happy customers with many of them right here in Havre De Grace, Maryland. Just as Havre De Grace residents take pride in the National Historic Landmark, Sion Hill, the home of the Rodgers family who are recognized for their significant contribution to America’s naval history, The Gutter Guys proudly service and install rain gutters, gutter guards, seamless gutters and offer gutter cleaning and gutter repairs for homes and businesses in and around Havre De Grace, MD .
Click below to meet Dan Harrison of The Gutter Guys, Havre De Grace MD! Call today! 410-420-7886 or 1-800-GUTTER-1
Located in Harford County, Maryland, Havre de Grace, also abbreviated as HdG, sits at the mouth of the Susquehanna River where it joins with the Chesapeake Bay. It is named after the French port city, Le Havre, meaning Harbor of Grace. Havre de Grace is located approximately five miles from Aberdeen and fifteen miles north of Bel Air, Maryland.
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Established in 1988, The Gutter Guys is a full service rain gutter company. We have over 300,000 happy customers with many of them right here in Oliver Beach, Maryland. Just as Oliver Beach residents take pride in the Oliver Beach Martial Arts, a compressed combination of GojuRyu, Ninjutsu and other martial arts styles, which is the community’s way to help its residents better protect themselves, The Gutter Guys proudly service and install rain gutters, gutter guards, seamless gutters and offer gutter cleaning and gutter repairs for homes and businesses in and around Oliver Beach, MD .
Click below to meet Dan Harrison of The Gutter Guys, Oliver Beach MD! Call today! 410-420-7886 or 1-800-GUTTER-1
Oliver Beach was first inhabited by the Susquehannok Indians. The land that is now known as Oliver Beach was a land grant given by Lord Calvert to Thomas Harwood in 1664. At one time the waterfront community was a summer home for many residents of Baltimore which many made their permanent home.
More about Michael Williams, founder of The Gutter Guys, on Google+
