Insights
We are the UK's only dedicated accounting practice focused exclusively on short-term let and holiday let operators. These are the tax and compliance issues we handle daily, written up for the operators handling them themselves.
From 6 April 2026 the 100% inheritance tax relief on qualifying business property is capped at £2.5m combined with agricultural relief, with the excess dropping to 50%. Combined with the FHL abolition, most STL portfolios now have no BPR at all — and succession planning needs a rebuild.
Most STL bookkeeping we inherit is a variation of the same theme: gross bookings and platform fees netted off, one line per payout, no per-property split. This is the chart-of-accounts structure that produces a useful set of numbers instead.
Around 1.8 million UK fixed-rate mortgages roll off in 2026, many held by STL landlords. The lender criteria they will face on remortgage are materially tighter than the ones they signed up under. This is what the accounts and evidence pack should look like.
Every UK nation has raised the tax on additional-dwelling purchases in the last two years. This is what an operator now pays to acquire in England, Scotland or Wales, and the structural decisions to make before completion.
Post-FHL, an operator selling an STL faces higher-rate CGT rather than the 10% BADR rate that used to apply. The pre-sale accounting work that used to be optional is now decisive - both on the buyer's price and on the seller's tax bill.
The abolition of the FHL regime has moved the tax gap between running an STL as a sole trader and running it through a limited company. For portfolios of any real size, the Ltd route now saves more tax than it did under the old regime - but the transition costs are real and the fit depends heavily on your borrowing structure.