People tend to take gutters for granted, that is for sure. Even at new homes, just being sold to someone for the first time, the builder will not clean gutters that have large quantities of accumulated debris -- from pieces of shingle and nails to organic matter that collected in the course of construction. Then there are a few people who just really like their old wood gutters. They like the antique aspect of them instead of thinking of the practical fact that most of these are ancient, rotten and are leaking. The photo below is a garage with a wood gutter. There are a couple problems here. First, the end of the gutter is leaking profusely, so the rafter tail is getting it there. Also, there is no shingle flashing over the rafter tail so water running down the roof is also running over the top of the rafter tail. Conditions like this, give just a bit of time, will always result in decay if the rafter. That is just the biology of rot.
Bellingham Home Inspector
Steven L. Smith
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