REMEZ & PARTNERS

The Let Property Campaign

The Let Property Campaign is HMRC's route for individual landlords to declare rental income they have not previously reported. You notify HMRC, then have 90 days from the date HMRC acknowledges your notification to calculate and pay what is owed. Penalties are materially lower for a disclosure made before HMRC contacts you than for one prompted by a letter.

More landlords are in this position than admit it, and the stories are ordinary: an inherited flat, a property kept after moving in with someone, a few years abroad with a tenant paying into an old account. There is a designed route back, and it is much cheaper than the alternative.

Why HMRC already knows about the property

Tenancy deposit schemes, local authorities and letting agents all report data, and HMRC matches it against returns. That is why nudge letters about rental income are so specific: they are not fishing, they are reconciling.

The practical consequence is that "they probably have not noticed" is not a strategy. The question is only whether you arrive first.

How the disclosure works

  1. Work out the position first. Which years, how much rent, what costs are allowable, what the tax actually is. Do this before notifying, not after.
  2. Notify HMRC of your intention to disclose under the campaign.
  3. HMRC acknowledges and the 90 days starts.
  4. Submit the disclosure and pay within the window. The disclosure and the payment are both due by that date, unless more time has been agreed in advance.
  5. HMRC reviews it and confirms, or comes back with questions.

The order of the first two steps is the part people get wrong. Notifying starts a 90-day clock that runs whether or not you can find the bank statements from 2019.

What it actually costs

Three components, and only the third is negotiable:

  • The tax on the rental profit for each year — after allowable costs, which many people have never claimed and which reduce it more than they expect.
  • Interest from each year's original due date.
  • A penalty, expressed as a percentage of the tax, and this is where the range is enormous.

Penalties depend heavily on whether the disclosure was unprompted, made before HMRC approached you, or prompted by contact from them. A careless, unprompted disclosure can attract a very low penalty — in some cases none at all. The same facts, disclosed after a letter, cost significantly more. And a deliberate concealment pursued by HMRC rather than disclosed is a different conversation entirely, with twenty years on the table.

Note also that rental profit is not rent received. Mortgage interest is relieved as a20% tax reducer rather than deducted, letting agent fees and repairs come off, and for many landlords the tax on the years in question turns out to be smaller than the sum they had been dreading. See landlord tax for how the calculation actually works.

Talk it through before anything is filed

Tell us what the property is and roughly how long. We will work out the real exposure — years, tax, likely penalty range — before a word goes to HMRC, and you decide what happens next. Confidential, and free.

Or send an email

Free assessment first. If there is work to do, you get a fixed quote in writing before anything starts.

What we do

  • Establish which years are genuinely in scope, which is often fewer than feared
  • Reconstruct the rental accounts, including costs never claimed
  • Argue the behaviour characterisation — careless rather than deliberate is the difference between six years and twenty
  • Prepare and submit the disclosure, and deal with HMRC's questions
  • Put the following years on a proper footing so this does not recur

If the income was foreign rather than UK, the route is different — seedisclosing to HMRC for the offshore facility and the general service.

Questions people ask

How many years do I have to declare?

It depends on how the omission is characterised: 4 years for an innocent error, 6 years where HMRC considers you careless, up to 20 years where it believes the income was hidden deliberately. That judgement is where most of the money is, and coming forward voluntarily influences it.

How long do I have once I notify HMRC?

90 days from the date HMRC acknowledges your notification. The disclosure and the payment are both due by that date, unless more time has been agreed in advance. Notify before the records are gathered and the clock is running while you look for them, which is why the order of those two steps matters.

Will I be prosecuted?

The campaign exists precisely to offer a route that is not prosecution. Criminal investigation is reserved for the serious end — sustained, deliberate concealment — and a voluntary disclosure made before HMRC approaches you is the strongest evidence against that characterisation.

I only rented one room, or one flat, for a couple of years.

That is the typical case, not the exception. Inherited flats, a property kept after moving in with a partner, a room let while working abroad. The campaign is designed for exactly these, and the amounts involved are usually far smaller than people fear.

Does it cover companies?

No — the Let Property Campaign is for individual landlords. Property held through a company is a different disclosure route, and worth taking advice on before opening anything.

I already had a letter from HMRC. Is it too late?

Not too late to disclose, but the terms are worse: the disclosure is now prompted rather than unprompted, and that distinction affects the penalty. It still beats waiting for an assessment — which will be HMRC's estimate of what you owe, not yours.

Figures are for the tax year shown and change every April. They are general information, not advice — we check the current position for your circumstances before anything is filed.

Reviewed 19 October 2026.

Part of our work on hmrc letters and disclosures — if you want someone to take it off your hands, start with our what your HMRC letter means page.