The truth about gutter guards from a 17-year home service professional

A good friend texted me recently asking a question I’ve heard many times over almost two decades of running a home service company. 

He had bought his first home (congrats!) and had exuberantly begun planning small home improvements. It’s the type of excitement that most homeowners remember fondly. Adorning your first castle to make it your own. 

In this case it was his gutters he was wondering about. ‘Have you had any experience with gutter guards? Wondering if it’s worth it instead of cleaning gutters every year?’

Gutter guards have many names: leaf covers, filters, screens, but they all promise to fulfill the same basic task: block debris from entering your gutter troughs. We have cleaned hundreds of them over the years, of all types. 

The short answer to his question is: it depends.

What gutter guards promise to do 

Gutter guards are installations that mount to the gutter in order to stop tree fall such as leaves, twigs, pine cones and needles from entering the gutter trough. Some are designed to cast off the debris so that it falls to the ground instead of remaining on top of the cover. Then, in theory, water and precipitation will be able to flow freely from your roofline and into the gutter. From there, water moves toward the downspout, cascades into the downpipes, and away from your home or structure. 

Sounds simple right? It isn’t, at all. 

How leaf covers actually work  

In practice, when autumn arrives, leaves and needles land on the surface of the gutter guards and do one of two things: slough off over time or remain in place and begin to break down. 

This is where the level of tree cover you have on your property really plays a role. The more deciduous trees you have the more you’ll need to manage the leafy mess they make once per year. The easiest way to know how much tree cover you have is to look up and observe how many trees dwarf the highest point of your roof. The more green giants you have, the more debris there will be in your gutters. 

Don’t forget to look beyond your property line as well. Your neighbours may have a few behemoths that provide that beautiful shade in the summer but an organic mess in the fall.   

Tree cover on or near your property will impact how often you should clean your gutters.

If you have a low level of tree cover it raises the probability that gutter guards would provide reasonable protection each year. Falling organic debris would either land and blow off eventually, or slowly degrade over time and seep into the gutter trough. The leafy sludge could then wash down the system and not create clogs or back-up. 

In our experience, at least in the Lower Mainland Region of British Columbia, this is a relatively rare experience for most homeowners. 

What is more likely is the following: 

If you have conifers that drop bunches of needles or anything beyond a low level of tree cover, your formerly green friends will heap their mess squarely on the guards.

The detritus will then pass into your gutter troughs in the case of needles or completely block the gutters entirely, forming a mucky barrier that stops water and precipitation from passing through.

Gutter guards for a recent customer, showing the level of tree debris that can accumulate.

In both cases you’ll need a gutter cleaning company to come and sweep off the surfaces of the covers or actually uninstall the guards, clean the gutter troughs, and reinstall the guards which can be costly given the additional labour required. 

Gutter guards vs. gutter cleaning 

For homeowners who have a low level of tree cover, it may be cost effective to have gutter guards installed. For some, it gives them the peace of mind that the gutter system will have to be cleaned less often. 

For those lucky enough to have beautiful (but sometimes pesky) medium to high levels of tree cover, or an evergreen friend that drops the occasional needle, it is important to weigh the cost benefit of installing gutter guards. 

Gutter guard systems come with an upfront cost and can range in price from $1,000 to $3,000 for the average Metro Vancouver home. Some fancy systems can cost more than $5,000. There are so many choices of gutter guards that it would take another two posts to describe them all. What we would suggest is to carefully research all options available in your area. This post has a nice breakdown.

The key thing to remember is that even if you have gutter guards, you will still need to have your gutters cleaned at least once per year. 

It’s possible that the gutter guards will reduce the cost of the cleaning because the gutter cleaning company will only have to sweep the tops of the guards instead of emptying the troughs and flushing the system. 

However, in our almost 20 years of experience the difference in labour here can be quite minimal. You may find that your local gutter cleaning company will charge you a similar amount to clean gutter guards compared to open gutters because the majority of the time and effort comes from travel and access set-up such as ladders.

If you think about it, sweeping by hand versus emptying by hand takes a similar amount of time. 

Where it gets complicated is if your gutter system develops a clog or blockage underneath the gutter guards. It will then cost almost twice as much to have a gutter cleaning company remove the guards, clean underneath them, and replace the gutter guards. This could also have implications on your warranty.

Our average gutter cleaning cost is around $300 for a Metro Vancouver home. Based on the above upfront cost for a gutter guard system, that means it would take between three to 10 years for your gutter guard system to pay for itself, if and only if you never needed the guards cleaned. 

A more likely scenario in the Lower Mainland is that you would have the gutter guards installed and still need to have your gutters cleaned in some way once per year.

The bottom line 

Gutter guards may reduce the amount of debris in your gutters if you have a low level of tree cover. However, a more likely scenario is that the gutters will still need to be cleaned every year because of leaves, needles, twigs, and other debris settling on the surface of the guards.

Therefore, the upfront cost of gutter guards plus the cost of an annual cleaning may exclude most British Columbia homeowners from seriously considering most gutter guard options.