In January 2017, we had to address the fascia, as we knew when we bought the place there were pockets of dry rot. We wanted to put gutters on the house–none were ever added since its construction fifty years ago, so for the most part rain just ran off the roofs and onto the ground. This was no good if we ever wanted to implement any sort of rainwater collection system.
I called about a half a dozen contractors, but no one seemed very interested in the work. Getting quotes was difficult enough; getting quotes that weren’t exorbitant was next to impossible. Enter our now-regular house painter Humberto. He had come to us as a subcontractor for the arbor repairs a few years ago, and then we hired him to paint the north hallway and powder room in 2017 while waiting for the general contractor to finish work in the studio building, as Humberto was then to paint that space. He worked for us again last year when I went off on vacation and he painted my office two lovely shades of rose. Humberto hadn’t actually done a lot of woodwork outside of his own house, but he jumped at the challenge to help us seal everything up.
Here are some before and after shots:
Southeast corner:
The southern side of the house:
The northwest corner:
There were lots of other areas that need special attention but you get the general idea. In addition to tidying up all the top trim, he also made sure all the small bits like these nails that were walking their way out of the corners of the studio building were fixed.
Once the fascia was all pretty, it was time to cover it up with new gutters!