Joiner in Leasowe and Saughall Massie

Leasowe sits on low, flat land behind the embankment, and a good deal of the housing is postwar with solid concrete ground floors. Where those floors were laid without an effective membrane, or where the membrane has been compromised by later work, moisture comes up through the slab slowly and steadily.

It does not usually show as a wet floor. It shows as a laminate that cups a year after it was laid, or an engineered board that lifts at the edges in one corner of a room. That is why we test a solid floor for moisture before quoting flooring here rather than after laying it, and why the honest answer in some Leasowe houses is a floor covering other than wood.

The same thinking applies to anything fixed near the floor: skirting in a room with a damp slab wants to be a material that will cope rather than softwood painted and hoped for.

Most of Leasowe is planned postwar estate housing with a consistent layout, which makes the work predictable and keeps the price down. Openings are standard, blockwork takes fixings, and there is usually room to work.

Saughall Massie is different again: an old village core with some genuinely old property and some newer infill around it. The older houses there are the ones where you take a panel off and find something nobody expected, so we look before we price rather than quote off a description.

Leasowe is minutes from us and we are in and out of it constantly. For small work it is about as easy as it gets to fit in, and for larger work it means an early start without a travel allowance in the price.

Access across the estates is good, with space to unload at the door on nearly every road.