What a Landlord Must Provide in England (2026): By Law, Furnished and Unfurnished

In England the law makes a landlord provide a home that is fit to live in and kept in repair, a smoke alarm on every storey with living accommodation, a carbon monoxide alarm in any lived-in room with a fixed combustion appliance other than a gas cooker, gas and electrics that are safe and checked, and an Energy Performance Certificate at band E or above. It does not make you supply a fridge, a washing machine, carpets, curtains or any furniture at all.

What you do supply has to be safe. In a furnished let that means the beds, mattresses and sofas must meet the furniture fire safety rules of 1988.

Below are both lists, each line with its source, read on 25 October 2026, then what changes when you furnish. The documents a new tenant must be given have their own checklist, and the repairing duty has its own guide. Everything here is for England. Wales and Scotland have their own rules.

What the law requires a landlord to provide

For a tenancy of a whole home in England, these are the duties that put something in the property or keep it working:

The government plans to raise the energy minimum to band C by 1 October 2030, but the regulations that would make it law have not been made. The EPC guide follows it.

Three points sit behind the table:

• Fitness covers almost every let. It applies to a tenancy granted for less than seven years (section 9B), which is nearly every private tenancy. You are not liable where the problem is wholly or mainly caused by the tenant breaking the tenancy (section 9A(3)).
• Section 11 keeps in repair what is there. It does not reach your appliances. It covers basins, sinks, baths and toilets, "but not other fixtures, fittings and appliances for making use of the supply of water, gas or electricity" (section 11(1)(b)). A washing machine you supply is not a section 11 repair, so the tenancy agreement should say who fixes it.
• A licensed property carries more. Every HMO licence and selective licence must require the holder to keep the electrical appliances and furniture they make available in a safe condition, and to give the council a declaration of their safety on demand (Housing Act 2004, Schedule 4, paragraph 1(3)).

Councils judge hazards under the HHSRS, which has had 21 hazards since 23 June 2026. The full list and how each is scored has its own guide.

What the law does not make you provide

Most of what a tenant sees in a furnished home is not required by any Act. The nearest thing to an official list of what a home should have is the checklist in the government's HHSRS landlord and agent guide, updated on 16 September 2026. The guide calls its baseline indicators "not mandatory standards". Anything that falls short of one, though, is a deficiency a council inspector goes on to assess.

The cooker

No Act says a landlord must supply a cooker. Fitness, though, is judged partly on the "facilities for preparation and cooking of food" (section 10), and since 23 June 2026 the HHSRS counts "An inadequate provision of facilities for the storage, preparation and cooking of food" as part of its domestic hygiene hazard (Schedule 1, paragraph 14A).

The landlord guide makes it concrete. Its baseline is "A 4-ring hob (or 2-ring in bedsits) with oven and grill" (item 5.4) and, "Where an oven or hob is not provided, a dedicated space with connection to gas or electric" (item 5.5). So an unfurnished kitchen does not need a cooker in it, but it should have somewhere the tenant can connect one. A kitchen with neither is the kind of defect the fitness test looks at.

Carpets

The government asked in its Decent Homes Standard consultation whether landlords should provide suitable floor coverings in all rooms at the start of every new tenancy. Its response of 28 January 2026 said no: "the Government will not be introducing a mandatory requirement on floor coverings in the DHS" (paragraph 163). For private rentals it gave the reason that the sector already provides floor coverings "in the vast majority of cases" (paragraph 155). The Standard does not apply to private rentals yet; the government says it will from 2035.

Carpets you do fit go on the check-in inventory, so their condition at check-out can be set against how they began. On stairs the guide asks for coverings "securely and safely fastened" (item 12.3). Carpets and mats are outside the furniture fire rules (regulation 3).

Pests

Exposure to pests has been part of the HHSRS domestic hygiene hazard since 23 June 2026 (paragraph 14A(3)), and a hazard prescribed under the HHSRS is one of the matters fitness is judged on. A broken drain or a gap in an outside wall is a section 11 repair (the structure and exterior, drains included), and an infestation bad enough to make the home not reasonably suitable to live in (the test in section 10(1)) breaches the fitness duty. The fitness duty does not reach a problem wholly or mainly caused by the tenant breaking the tenancy, such as rubbish left to pile up (section 9A(3)). Put both cases in the tenancy agreement.

Furnished, part furnished and unfurnished

No Act defines a furnished, part furnished or unfurnished let in England. The words describe what you supply, and the duties follow the items: whatever is in the home because you put it there is yours to keep safe. A furnished let must have nothing an unfurnished one does not. It only holds more things to keep safe. Write the furnishing level into the tenancy agreement and list each item in the check-in inventory.

The furniture fire rules

The 1988 Regulations set fire tests for the fillings and covers of furniture "ordinarily intended for private use in a dwelling". They reach furniture let with a home because supplying goods includes "hiring out or lending" them (Consumer Protection Act 1987, s.46). For a let, as the rules stand on 25 October 2026:

• Check the permanent label on each upholstered item before it goes in, and photograph it for the inventory. The display label that new furniture used to carry has not been required since 30 October 2025; the permanent label still is (GOV.UK guidance on the 2025 changes). The HHSRS landlord guide expects furniture you supply to be "correctly labelled for fire resistance" (item 19.1).
• Second-hand furniture must pass the same tests (regulation 14), and the same GOV.UK guidance says second-hand supply still needs the permanent label. Look for one before you buy.
• Furniture made before 1 January 1950 is outside the rules (regulation 4), and so are bedding and floor coverings (regulation 3).
• Cots, highchairs, play pens and mattresses for babies and children under 170 cm by 75 cm left the rules on 30 October 2025. They must still be safe under the General Product Safety Regulations 2005.

A change is proposed, not made. The government consulted from 31 March to 23 June 2026 on replacing the 1988 rules with requirements based on a smoulder test, and has published no response. Until new regulations are made, the 1988 rules apply. The fire safety guide covers the rest of a let's fire duties, building by building.

Appliances you supply

No Act makes you PAT test the appliances in a single let. GOV.UK tells landlords they must "make sure all gas equipment and electrical equipment is safely installed and maintained" (Renting out your property: landlord responsibilities). A gas cooker you supply goes into the annual gas safety check, which covers every gas appliance except one the tenant is entitled to remove (regulation 36(1)).

The HHSRS guide sets a baseline, not a law: appliances you supply are subject to testing in line with the IET Code of Practice for In-service Inspection and Testing of Electrical Equipment, unless they are under one year old and display a UKCA or CE mark (item 19.2). The PAT testing guide covers how often.

Who repairs a supplied appliance is for the tenancy agreement, because section 11 leaves appliances out. Write it down: which appliances are yours, that you repair or replace them when they wear out, and that the tenant pays for damage they cause.

Replacing what you supplied: the tax rule

HMRC allows a deduction for replacing a domestic item in a let home: moveable furniture, furnishings such as curtains, rugs and carpets, appliances such as fridges, freezers and washing machines, and kitchenware. Buying the first one gets no deduction under this relief. An upgrade counts only up to what a like-for-like replacement would have cost, and no capital allowances can have been claimed on the new item. Delivering and installing it, and disposing of the old one, add to the deduction. Money you get for the old item comes off it: sell the old sofa for £100 and buy a like-for-like one for £600, and the deduction is £500. A part-exchange value counts the same way. There is no deduction for a home where you claim Rent-a-Room relief on its rents. Fixtures such as baths, toilets and built-in wardrobes are not domestic items (HMRC, PIM3210). The relief works the same way in an unfurnished let: replacing carpets you put in counts.

One flat, let both ways

A one-bedroom ground-floor flat in England, with a gas combi boiler in the kitchen and a gas hob. Here is what the landlord carries on the first day, let unfurnished and then let furnished:

The legal floor is the same in both columns. Each item you add brings a safety duty, a line on the inventory and a repair question.

Before the keys change hands

1. 1Write the furnishing level into the tenancy agreement, with a list of the appliances you supply and who repairs them.
2. 2Check the permanent fire label on every upholstered item and photograph it.
3. 3Walk the check-in inventory room by room: every item you supplied, its condition and photos, the meter readings and the keys. Ask the tenant to sign it.
4. 4Test each smoke and carbon monoxide alarm on the day the tenancy begins, and record the test.
5. 5Give the documents by their deadlines. The documents checklist sets out which and when.

Recording what you supplied

LetCompliance runs the let from one account, from the advert and the tenancy to the rent and the repairs. Three parts of it cover what this guide asks of you.

The check-in inventory is laid out room by room, with photos for each item, and the meters, the keys and the alarm tests at handover on the same list. Each tenant signs it online. At check-out it is set against the check-in item by item, and any deduction is worked out from the item's age and lifespan, never for fair wear and tear. Inventories come with every paid plan, from £7.99 a month, and with the 3-day trial.

The move-in pack emails each tenant the gas safety record, EICR, EPC, deposit prescribed information and tenancy agreement in one go, names anything not uploaded yet before it sends, and logs each document with the date. The alarm check is recorded against the tenancy.

Each certificate's expiry date sits on the property, with email reminders 90, 30, 14, 7 and 1 days before it runs out. The move-in pack and the reminders are on every plan. LetCompliance is software: you walk the property with your phone, and it keeps the record.

Record what you supplied before the keys go.