I was called to this home in Port Perry back in 2012. At the time I explained to the homeowner that they needed to replace their eavestroughs as they were poorly graded and the downspouts were in the wrong locations. I made this recommendation even though the eaves were only 15 years old, and you should usually get about 24 years out of your eavestrough system. This usually happens when the job is not done properly when initially installed.
Well, as you can imagine, that didn’t go over too well. The homeowner insisted that the issue could be repaired rather than installing a new gutter system. He even accused me of trying to gouge him, since I didn’t do any repairs. I politely explained to him that I had been in this business for 30 years, and I that I didn’t get here by gouging and lying to customers. So I explained to them again where I would position the downpipes. Also, I would have changed the eaves to a 5″ width (they had 4″ gutters) and I would also increase the size of the downpipes to 3″ x 3″ to accommodate the flow of water going through when needed.
Fast forward two years, and I get a call from them this past fall. They had paid a “professional” to do some of the repair work, but were still having an overflow problem in heavy rains. Could I come by and see what could be done. Well, things had gone from bad to worse! The so called “professionals” had moved the downpipes, but had not re-graded them and water was still flowing the wrong way! And to make matters worse, they had made a “little dam-like” stopper out of aluminum to try and stop the water from flowing down a certain way in the gutters! But all that did was to cause the water to overflow over the eaves in the middle of the trough length. Unbelievable! The photos below show you what I mean.
So the homeowner asked me again if I could repair this. I told him the same thing that I had told him two years earlier — this can’t be repaired, it has to be replaced. Well the homeowner finally admitted that they had made a mistake of getting the work done by a company with a reputation of doing “low ball” work, with no regards to quality, and that they should have gotten a professional like myself to do the work right from the beginning.
The bottom line is that I have been in this business long enough to give people advice, and I’m usually right 90% of the time. I honestly try not to drive people in the wrong direction. If I see a job that can be repaired, I will refer them to an associate that I trust to do the repairs properly. And most of the time, you get what you pay for.
At True North Eavestroughing, Quality is our Priority!
