Buy to let is a business, and as a business owner, making a profit is a priority (unless you are a landlord for purely altruistic reasons!). Rental yield is one of those terms bandied about in landlord circles, but would-be landlords are not always sure what it means. In this article, we aim to give you an easy-to-understand explanation of rental yields, so you can work out if a rental property is making a reasonable profit.
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It was 3am. I had one of those wake-ups that takes you a while to recover from. The kind that starts with your heart beating intensely before you understand what’s woken you.
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HMRCs Let Property campaign is working. A Freedom of Information request submitted by a leading accounting firm has revealed that the number of landlords ‘fessing up’ to unpaid rental income has risen by a huge 145%. Clearly, the aggressive mailshots and menacing letters sent out by HMRC are having the desired effect.
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It’s no surprise that lots of landlords use spreadsheets to manage their properties. When you first start out, maybe you’ve got one or two rental properties and only a handful of tenants, in which case your spreadsheet is enough.
If you’re anything like me and you’ve spent most of your working years tripping the cell fantastic in Excel it’s probably child’s play – you might even have some conditional formatting thrown in for good measure. If you’re new to the world of spreadsheets, or you’ve never delved into the confusingly named Excel features it’s easy to get lost in the miasma of Excel functions and formulas.
Making Tax Digital (MTD) is already underway. MTD for VAT was rolled out at the beginning of April, with VAT registered businesses now required to submit their VAT returns using the Making Tax Digital service. Some businesses are currently exempt, including those with complex VAT requirements, but they must be ready to go by October 2019.
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