I get asked this a lot, usually by someone who’s just paid me and would rather not pay me again.
Fair enough. So here’s a straight answer, including the part that costs me work.
For most houses round here, gutter guards don’t solve the problem — because leaves aren’t the problem. For a minority of houses they’re genuinely worth it. Here’s how to tell which you are.
What they’re actually designed for
Gutter guards — mesh, brush inserts, hedgehog strips, solid hood covers — are designed to stop large debris entering the gutter. Specifically, leaves.
They work reasonably well at that. If you sit under a mature beech or a sycamore and spend every November hauling out handfuls of leaf mulch, a good mesh will genuinely reduce that.
The catch is what they don’t stop.
What actually fills gutters in Lanarkshire
I’ve been clearing gutters round Airdrie, Coatbridge and Motherwell since 2016. What comes out, in rough order of volume:
- Moss — shed off concrete roof tiles, continuously, all year
- Grit and fine stone — off pebbledash and harling render
- Silt — windblown, gradual, universal
- Leaves — genuinely fourth, unless you have trees right over the roof
Now look at that list against what a mesh stops. Moss fragments, grit and silt are all smaller than the mesh aperture. They go straight through, exactly as before.
So on a typical treeless pebbledash semi, a gutter guard stops roughly the fourth-biggest contributor and lets the top three past.
And then there’s the mesh itself
Here’s the bit installers tend not to lead with.
Fine debris that goes through a mesh is easy to remove from an open gutter. Fine debris that sits on top of a mesh is a different job — because now there’s a lid between you and it.
What I actually find on guarded gutters:
Moss growing on the mesh. It’s a damp, textured surface at roof level. Of course moss grows on it. Then it mats, and the mesh stops draining — so water sheets straight over the front, and the gutter underneath is bone dry and perfectly clean while your wall gets soaked.
Silt cemented into the weave. Fine grit plus rain plus time equals a solid crust. It doesn’t brush off.
Awkward removal. Clip-in mesh comes out easily enough. Solid hood systems that screw under the first course of tiles do not, and taking them off and refitting them turns a £50 clean into something considerably more.
When they are worth it
I’m not against them. There’s a clear case:
- Mature trees directly over the roof. Sycamore, beech, lime. If you’re currently paying for two clears a year purely because of leaves, a good mesh may take you to one.
- A slate or clay roof. These shed far less than concrete tile. If your roof isn’t producing moss, the biggest thing the mesh can’t stop mostly isn’t there.
- Genuinely difficult access. Somewhere a clear is expensive enough that reducing the frequency changes the maths.
If two or three of those are true, mesh is a reasonable buy. If none of them are true — pebbledash, concrete tiles, no big trees, which describes an awful lot of North Lanarkshire — you’d be paying to solve a problem you don’t have, and creating a new one.
The honest maths
A gutter clear on a typical semi here is from £50, once a year.
Guards on the same house are a several-hundred-pound job, and they don’t remove the need for a clean — they change what the clean involves. If the mesh needs lifting, brushing and refitting, it often costs more per visit than the open gutter did.
I’d rather you spent £50 a year and kept the money.
What to ask if you’re getting a quote for them
- Is it removable without tools? Clip-in, yes. Screwed under the tiles, think hard.
- What’s the aperture? Fine enough to stop moss fragments will also clog. Coarse enough not to clog will let moss through. There is no setting that does both.
- What happens to the moss on top? If there’s no answer, that’s your answer.
What I’d suggest instead
For most houses here, if you want to genuinely reduce gutter cleaning, deal with the roof.
Moss on the tiles is the single biggest contributor round here, and it’s the one thing that keeps refilling a gutter you’ve just paid to clear. A soft-wash roof treatment keeps tiles clear for three to five years, and it stops the source rather than filtering it.
What it costs
- Gutter clearing from £25 per side — typical semi from £50
- Roof cleaning from £200, quoted after I’ve seen it
- Doing both in one visit saves you a trip-out, which is usually where the saving is
If you’re not sure which group you’re in, send me a photo of your roof and gutter line and your postcode. I’ll tell you honestly whether guards would help you — including when the answer is that they’d be a waste of your money. 07440347383