Hopefully, most homeowners already realize the importance of gutters for their homes.
Gutters can protect your foundation by channeling rainwater away from home’s foundation, preventing water damage to the foundation and water seepage into the basement. Even with gutters, make sure your landscaping slopes away from your home’s foundation.
Gutters can also help to preserve your home’s landscaping in several important ways. First, when rainwater from the roof is directed away from the base of the home, the dirt and other landscaping materials should remain intact, even after a big rainstorm. Second, with gutters directing rainwater away from your home in an orderly fashion through some sort of a splash apron where the downspout dumps, your dirt will remain in place, plants will remain rooted and you won’t experience any wash-out from excessive water.
Gutters on your home can also protect your home’s fascia boards, soffit and siding. By not allowing rivers of water to drain across your home’s fascia, soffits and siding, you will prevent water damage to these mostly wooden or siding-board materials.
Gutters are amazingly cheap for all the protection they afford your home.
While we can’t begin to give you an estimate of a gutter installation job in your hometown, you can be fairly certain that steel, seamless gutters, installed by a gutter professional, will be one of the cheapest items you’ll purchase for your home!
So, why would you still want to install DIY gutters on your home?
Sure, you can buy them in length at your local big-box home-improvement store. Normally sold in 10 foot lengths, low-cost steel and plastic gutters are really inexpensive.
But, consider the installation. You’ll have to join the sections with pre-formed steel or plastic joints, and you’ll need to glue them together as well. Hopefully, they won’t leak! If the joints do leak, you’ll have to let them dry and then go back with a silicone caulk gun and try to seal the joints with gobs of silicone caulking. The joints can be sealed, but sometime they take work.
For the length that’s less than 10 feet, you’ll need to cut the length of gutter. If you have a cut-off saw, that’s great. But most of us will be cutting with a hack saw – and that’s hard work!
Don’t forget the corner pieces you’ll need to attach and glue. If they leak, it’s practically impossible to re-seal the joints. Since your installation will be made up of 10 foot lengths, do you really think you will get each piece perfectly straight? I doubt it! Chances are your DIY gutter job will look like an amateur installation.
Finally, think of your safety. Do you really want to be perched out on a ladder, 10 feet to 30 feet off the ground, wrestling with sections of gutter, and gluing seams? How about the time it’ll take you to install your gutters – a normal sized house could take an entire weekend – or more! That’s not how I want to spend my time!
For the minimal amount that professional gutter companies charge, and for the superior, straight and attractive installation that a seamless gutter system will offer, it just doesn’t pay to do a DIY gutter system!
About The Author
Dan Morton is a local business owner, small business owner/operator and a confirmed home maintenance and improvement DIYer with over 30 years of home improvement and maintenance experience GuttersColoradoSprings.com is a fun little side project he maintains because of his fascination keeping homes functional and beautiful. If you would like to contact him or have any questions for him, please visit www.gutterscoloradosprings.com/contact/.