Check out your local yellow pages.

The first storm will overfill a rain barrel. Your goal should be to landscape your garden to have areas to catch the water on your property, making a temporary lake in a swale like low spot to allow the water to sink into the ground. You may be gardening over a hardpan that will NOT drain, in which case the water will end up in the city storm drain. My rain gutters cost $2500, and if done for a rain barrel full of water would be a poor investment. Al

If you are willing and able to do the work yourself and are not afraid of heights you can buy plastic or metal gutters, downspouts, and the connectors and brackets to connect and mount them is any big box home improvement center like Home Depot of Lowes. On a typical size house the parts would probably cost between $100 and $200, depending upon the size and complexity of the installation, at least that's what the cost was about ten or fifteen years ago when I did my house. Be aware that the way they price the stuff the connectors and mounting brackets will cost more than the actual gutters and downspouts.

Putting up gutters is a pain in the neck. They are expensive and the way they connect assures leakage. They get clogged with leaves and you have to climb up on your termite-eaten roof to clean them out. They make noise.

I have them on the back of the house for the same reasons you state, lauraella, but I sure don't like it.

Renee

I just bought some from Home Depot and had a handyman install them. Took less than a day. Good luck!

There are some areas that we could get ourselves, but not on the second story. Calistoga, sorry I live in a tract house in South Orange County, so no room to add that kind of landscaping. I wish! I just want to be able to save some of what we get to water my garden in the back during the summer. Plus it would save my planters from getting flooded! I will have to check out the yellow pages and maybe ask at Living Green, the new nursery out this way.

Pic of my side yard newly finished.
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The area on the left is the shade garden that was decimated by the runoff. I wanted to have gutters put in there are the rain barrell at the front of the garden by the gate.

Toodles,

Lauraella,
It sounds as if you live close to me. I am in MV. Let me know if you want the contact info of the guys that did my rain gutters. They also just completed my landscaping (concrete, sod, irrigation, patio covers,...)
NK
merewhitt at cox dot net

The ones I replaced my old ones with are continuous metal that is fabricated (bent and cut to size) at your place. The company that did it is an awning company and this kind does not leak.

At my previous residence which depended upon well water we hooked a 800 gallon take up to our gutters which were the do-it-yourself plastic kind we painted to match the house.