LESLIE: Lawrence in California is on the line with a snow and a roofing question. And calling from California about snow? What’s going on, Lawrence?
LAWRENCE: Well, I live about 3,000 feet up in the Sierras.
TOM: Ah. Nice.
LESLIE: Ah. And that explains your snow.
TOM: OK.
LAWRENCE: Oh, yeah, we do get snow. And I’ve got rain-gutter problems.
TOM: Alright. So what’s going on?
LAWRENCE: Well, I’ve got a metal roof on my house and of course, it snows a foot or two a snow.
TOM: OK.
LAWRENCE: And the snow slides off the metal roof. And when it does that, it takes my rain gutters with it.
TOM: Alright.
LAWRENCE: Is there a solution to that?
TOM: Yeah, there is. Couple of things. First of all, how are your rain gutters attached? Are they attached with spikes?
LAWRENCE: Yes.
TOM: OK. So what you want to do is – there are screws that you can use and they have – usually have Allen heads that you can replace the gutter spikes with and the ferrules – the tubes. And those are a much more permanent connection, which will totally secure the rain gutter to the fascia.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm. It’s not going to get back out.
TOM: And the second thing you might want to do is add some snow guards.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm. And those are simply – I mean they’re not – they kind of act like a clip but they run parallel to your roof’s edge, a little bit more up the roof. And usually do one or two rows of them, depending on the height, slope, size of your roof. And these act as little stoppers. So as the snow slides down, it doesn’t go beyond that little lip.
And there’s actually a great website dedicated specifically to metal-roofing needs and it’s MetalRoofSnowGuards.com. And they’re fairly easy to install and they really do stop that problem.
LAWRENCE: I’ll definitely look on the computer there; see if I can get something that resembles snow guards and go from there, I guess.
TOM: Alright. Well, good luck with that project. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.
LAWRENCE: Thank you so much. Have a good day.
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