Your gutters are designed to protect your home in the first place, but they don’t always work as designed. The gutter is supposed to capture water that is running down your room and direct it to a downspout. This keeps it from simply dripping off the roof’s edge, landing in the soil below, and causing damage to multiple parts of your home’s exterior along the way. If you don’t have gutter guards installed, it’s all too easy for the gutters to end up clogged with leaves and other debris. Once they’re clogged, the gutters stop functioning and might as well have never been installed. Gutter guards ensure your gutters do their job when it comes to protecting your home’s exterior from top to bottom.
Foundation Protection
The biggest problem from uncontrolled runoff from the roof is the very bottom of your home. The foundation plays a crucial role in supporting the weight of the structure and ensuring it can’t settle unevenly into the soil below it. Yet that soil that surrounds the concrete of the foundation must stay in place to support it as well. When rain drips off the roof’s edge, it tends to land on the soil directly next to the foundation. After a few years of dripping, the soil slowly washes away and forms voids around the foundation that allows the concrete to crack under the strain. Without working gutters topped by gutter guards, it’s possible for the foundation to become compromised in a way that damages the rest of the structure. Keeping your gutters working with the help of guards can prevent thousands of dollars of difficult foundation repairs many years down the road.
Siding Preservation
The part of your home’s exterior that will show wear and tear first if you don’t have gutter guards will be the siding. Gutters that fail start leaking dirty water down the siding that’s discolored by the leaves and other debris trapped inside. You may notice dark or brown streaks on the siding that start at the gutters or just below them. When the gutters are carrying water away correctly, this can’t happen unless there’s a very heavy rainstorm. Gutter guards will ensure that any water that runs out of the gutter in this case doesn’t mix with the debris inside it, leaving no visible marks on the siding. Don’t settle for dingy siding that becomes discolored just a few months after each pressure cleaning visit when gutter guards can permanently stop the staining problem. Gutter guards are particularly important to protect siding that can be compromised by constant moisture, such as genuine wood or cement boards.
Fascia and Soffits
The fascia boards are the vertical pieces that cover the area directly under the roof’s edge. The soffits are installed horizontally to run between the fascia and the home’s exterior wall. Between both parts, the roof’s edge is sealed to the exterior and encouraged to circulate air through the roof with careful venting. However, both parts of the home’s exterior are particularly at risk for water damage from gutter issues because they’re so close to this source of moisture. If the gutters are installed incorrectly in the first place, they’ll direct water right onto the fascia boards and may flood the soffits. Guards ensure that water runs down the gutter and into the downspout instead of spreading to the closest materials around the gutter. Fascia and soffit repairs can be quite costly if the damage has spread widely, so keep your gutters working properly to avoid these issues.
Edge of the Roof
Installing gutter guards can protect the edge of your roof from damage in multiple ways. First, clogged gutters tend to overflow in a way that splashes water back up onto the roof and lets the moisture soak in under the shingles. Many people discover widespread rot along the edges of their roof that compromises the entire structure after assuming their gutters were working as designed for years. Another potential form of damage comes from having to clean out the gutters multiple times a year if you don’t have guards in place. You shouldn’t lean the ladder against the gutters if you can help it to avoid cracking or bending them, so instead, you’ll rest your ladder on the edge of the shingles. This puts extra wear on the roof’s materials that can eventually lead to leaks that are hard to spot. Protecting the roof begins with putting on gutter guards that dramatically reduce the need to climb up there for cleaning.
Surrounding Landscape
Finally, being able to direct water with your gutter system preserves the beauty of your home landscaping efforts. Dripping water displaces soil, batters flower beds planted around the foundation, and generally makes it hard to keep everything beautiful and green. By directing runoff to a carefully designed rain garden or to a dry well where it can penetrate the soil, you’re helping water your landscape without the risk of erosion or damage. Don’t let your efforts at gardening go to waste when gutter guards can go a long way in maintaining the look of your landscape.
Of course, not all gutter guards offer the same level of protection to your home’s exterior. Choose Kguard for gutter protection you can count on as the years go by. Contact us today for more information on how we can help.
