Gutters and downspouts aren’t two separate products. They’re one system. A gutter that can’t drain fast enough overflows no matter how well it’s sized, and that’s one of the most common, avoidable causes of water damage we see in Metairie.
We install new gutter systems, replace old or failing ones, and repair specific problems like leaks, sagging, or sections pulled loose in a storm, always sizing the downspouts to match.
Part of our Exterior Services.
Lone Wolf Roofing has installed and repaired gutters across Jefferson Parish since 1993. We see the same mistake often: a home with gutters that look properly sized, paired with downspouts too small to actually drain them fast enough. During a hard rain, water backs up and spills over right at the corners, the exact spot you’d expect it not to.
Metairie gets around 62 inches of rain a year. That’s well above the national average of about 38 inches. It’s also more than cities like Houston or Charleston, which are already considered heavy-rainfall areas that need upgraded gutter systems. Standard 5-inch gutters are built for moderate rainfall. A 6-inch gutter holds about 67% more water per foot, and that extra capacity matters more here than in most parts of the country.
We default to 6-inch gutters for most Metairie homes. Not as an upsell. The standard size is often genuinely undersized for what this area actually gets.
A bigger gutter doesn’t help if the downspout underneath it can’t keep up. Downspouts need to match the gutter size, roughly 3×4 inches for a 6-inch gutter system. They also need to be spaced closely enough, no more than about every 35 to 40 feet along the run.
We see plenty of homes with the right gutters and the wrong downspouts. That mismatch is one of the most common reasons a gutter system fails during a hard rain.
We install seamless K-style aluminum gutters in both 5-inch and 6-inch sizes, formed on-site to fit your home rather than joined from pre-cut sections. Fewer seams means fewer places for a leak to start.
We use .032-inch aluminum rather than the thinner .027-inch gauge some contractors default to. It costs a little more, but it holds up better to Louisiana’s heavy rain and resists denting during a storm better than the thinner option. Gutters come in a range of factory-finished colors to match your fascia or trim, and aluminum resists rust, which matters in a climate this humid.
Metairie’s mature tree canopy means leaves and debris are a real, ongoing problem for open gutters, on top of the rainfall itself. Gutter guards cut down on how often gutters need to be cleaned out, and they address a different cause of overflow than sizing does: a clog, not a system that’s too small.
No guard makes a gutter maintenance-free forever. Fine debris like pine needles can still get through some styles, and guards still need an occasional check. But for most Metairie homes near mature trees, they’re worth the upfront cost in reduced cleaning and fewer clog-related overflows.
Gutters attach directly to your fascia, so soffit and fascia work and gutter work often go together. See our Exterior Services page for how all three fit as one system, along with siding.
We’ve had plenty of customers who wanted new gutters and nothing else. A few years later, they call us back because the new gutters are sagging or pulling away, and the real problem was never the gutters. It was fascia underneath that was already rotting when the gutters went up. New gutters mounted to compromised fascia don’t stay put for long, no matter how good the gutters themselves are. We’ll always tell you if we see something like that before we install anything, even if it means a slightly bigger job than you came in for.
Usually because the downspouts can’t drain the water fast enough, not because the gutters themselves are too small. We check both together, not just the part you can see from the ground.
As a general rule, one downspout for every 35 to 40 feet of gutter run, though valleys and corners often need more. We’ll map this out based on your actual roof, not a flat rule.
For most homes in this area, we recommend 6-inch, given how much rain Metairie gets in an average year. Smaller roofs with simple rooflines can sometimes still work with 5-inch, and we’ll tell you honestly if that’s the case for your home.
Away from your foundation, ideally toward the street or a drainage path, not just dumped at the base of the house. Given how flat and low-lying this area is, where the water actually goes matters as much as how fast it leaves the gutter.
