MTD for Airbnb and short-let hosts
Dozens of bookings a quarter, payouts from two or three platforms, cleaners paid every changeover, and HMRC wants a summary four times a year. QuarterFile keeps the digital records MTD requires and files the quarter from your bank statement.
HMRC recognition is in progress: filing opens for the 7 February 2027 quarter, and you can check your MTD date and join the reminder list today.
An illustration of the QuarterFile dashboard showing the current quarter, Q2, running from 6 July 2026 to 5 October 2026, with a filing deadline of 7 November 2026. It shows confirmed income and expense totals, a checklist confirming the quarter is ready, and a single button to review and file. The figures shown are examples.
Property (SA105, the property pages of your tax return)
Where a short let’s costs go
Short-let income is property income, so it uses the property categories. A host’s lines aren’t a landlord’s though, so these are the usual ones, suggested for you and confirmed by you:
- Platform service and payment-processing feesLegal, management and professional fees
- Cleaning, laundry and changeover helpServices you provide (including wages)
- Linen, towels and guest consumablesOther allowable property expenses
- Utilities, broadband and council tax you pay yourselfRates, insurance and ground rents
- Repairs between guestsRepairs and maintenance
Suggestions, not rulings: you confirm every line, and anything unusual is one for your accountant. Longer lets use the full property list.
Furnished Holiday Lettings ended on 6 April 2025
Short lets used to carry their own tax treatment under those rules. They are now taxed like any other rental, and for MTD nothing changes: short-let income always counted as property income. If you had FHL claims running, that transition is one for your accountant.
How MTD works for short-let hostsGross booking value, not the payout
MTD thresholds use gross income, which for most platforms means the full booking value before service and processing fees: those are an expense, recorded separately. Hosting on Airbnb and Booking.com at once is still one property business; the income is added together. MTD for Income Tax applies when your gross self-employment and property income is more than £50,000 (from April 2026), more than £30,000 (from April 2027) or more than £20,000 (from April 2028).
Forty bookings, one quarterly update
A busy season is dozens of payouts, a cleaner paid every changeover and a laundry bill every week, and all of it collapses into one summary four times a year. QuarterFile covers that part for £12.50 a quarter, first quarter free, and your records export any time. Free does the same filings by hand.
See pricingHost questions
What hosts ask first
Is Airbnb income property income or self-employment?
Property income, in almost every case. Letting a furnished place, even a night at a time, is a UK property business and it goes on the property pages (SA105), alongside any longer lets you have. It only becomes a trade if you provide substantial services beyond a normal let, the guest-house end of things with meals and daily room service. If yours sits near that line, ask your accountant before your first quarter.
I let a room in my own home. Does that count?
Often not. The rent-a-room scheme lets you receive up to £7,500 a year (£3,750 each if the income is shared) from letting furnished rooms in the home you live in, tax-free and with nothing to report. Above that threshold you choose between the allowance and normal property rules, and letting a whole property never qualifies: that’s ordinary property income. Ask your accountant which side of it you’re on.
Does Airbnb tell HMRC what I earn?
Yes. Under the digital platform reporting rules that began in January 2024, booking platforms report UK host details and payouts to HMRC once a year, and they send you a copy of what they reported. That created no new tax. The figures you file and the figures HMRC already holds should line up, which is easier when the records are built as the bookings happen rather than the week before a deadline.
Your season, your quarter
Bookings in, changeovers out.
Two platforms paying at different times, a cleaner between every guest, and a quarter that closes whether the season went well or not.
The dates, before the season starts
One email, 7 days before each quarterly deadline. No account, no software sign-up, nothing else ever.
We store your email address to send one reminder before each quarterly deadline, until you unsubscribe. Nothing else. How we handle your data.