The short answer
A spreadsheet records. It does not act. If you let one property, the tenant pays on time by standing order, your income is below the Making Tax Digital threshold and you open the sheet every month without fail, a sheet with the rent received, the costs and the certificate dates does the job. Plenty of landlords run that way for years, and nobody should sell them software they do not need.
Software is worth paying for when something has to happen without you remembering it: an email to the tenant when the rent is four days late, a warning months before the gas safety record runs out, a tenancy agreement signed online at eleven at night, a quarterly update sent to HMRC. If any of those is a job you do today from memory, that is the job the subscription buys.
When the sheet stops being enough
- Making Tax Digital reaches you. It applies when qualifying income is over £50,000 from 6 April 2026, over £30,000 from 6 April 2027 and over £20,000 from 6 April 2028 (GOV.UK, “Check if you’re eligible for Making Tax Digital for Income Tax”, updated 26 March 2026). A spreadsheet alone cannot send a quarterly update. It needs bridging software, and GOV.UK’s “Create digital records” (updated 16 October 2026) says the two must be digitally linked, for example by linked cells or a CSV import, with no copying, pasting or retyping between them.
- A second property, or a house let by the room. Every tenancy brings its own rent day, deposit and agreement, and every building its own certificates. The dates multiply faster than the tabs.
- A tenant who pays late. The sheet shows the gap only on the day you look at it, and the polite reminder only goes if you write it.
- Someone else needs the figures. A partner, an accountant, or a person covering while you are away cannot work from a file on your laptop.
How to decide, whatever you use
- Write down every job the let needs in a month and in a year: rent in, costs out, certificates, the deposit, the tenancy renewal or rent review, the tax return
- Mark which of those the sheet does for you (adding up) and which only happen because you remember
- For each remembered job, ask what one miss would cost: a month of arrears noticed late, a certificate lapsing with a tenant in the house, an update sent after 7 November
- Check the date Making Tax Digital starts for you, if it does
- Before paying anything, try importing your sheet into the software you are considering and see whether your own records come out right
Your options, compared
- A spreadsheet. Free with Google Sheets, or with Excel if you already have it, and nothing is more flexible. Where it falls short: no warnings unless you build them, nothing chases the tenant, no link to HMRC, and copies multiply when it is emailed around.
- A spreadsheet with bridging software for Making Tax Digital. GOV.UK allows it, as long as the sheet and the bridging product are digitally linked. You pay for the bridging product, and the sheet still does nothing for the rent, the tenant or the dates.
- A letting agent. The remembering is done for you, for a percentage of every month’s rent. Named agents’ published rates are on LetCompliance’s letting agent fees page, each with the date it was read. Where it falls short: the cost runs for as long as the let does, and the records sit with the agent.
- Landlord software. A monthly fee: in LetCompliance, Single at £7.99 a month for one property, Solo at £14.99 for up to 3, Portfolio at £19 for up to 10, Portfolio Plus at £29 for up to 20 and Professional at £49 for any number. Where it falls short: you still enter or import your data, it is one more login, and for a single simple let it may do more than you need.
What LetCompliance does that a sheet cannot
- Raises a rent charge for each tenancy on its rent day, records paid, part-paid and late, and makes the receipt as a PDF
- Chases late rent for you once you switch it on: you see a preview first, then the tenant gets a polite email every 4 days by default, up to three times, and nothing more than 90 days old is chased
- Collects rent by Direct Debit into your own Stripe account, with no commission taken. Stripe charges 1% of each Direct Debit payment with a 20p minimum and a £4 cap, and £5 for a disputed payment.
- Emails you 90, 30, 14, 7 and 1 days before each certificate expires, and before the deposit deadline
- Makes a tenancy agreement for the current law and sends it to be signed online, with an audit certificate
- Sends your Making Tax Digital quarterly updates to HMRC when you press send, as software recognised by HMRC for UK property income
- Gives the tenant their own link, with no password, to see their rent, report a repair with photos and find their documents
Bringing your spreadsheet in
Save the sheet as CSV, open Properties and choose Import. The import reads your column headings rather than their order. It needs an address, a town and a postcode, and takes as much else as you have: tenants one row each (or one row per room in an HMO), rent and how often it is due, deposit details, certificate dates, mortgage, insurance renewal, purchase price and current value. Columns it does not recognise are listed back to you by name, so nothing disappears without you knowing.
Upload the same sheet again later and it updates the properties already there instead of duplicating them, and a blank cell never clears anything. If you have no sheet worth importing, the import screen has a template with every column and example rows to overwrite.
Common mistakes
- Paying for software and keeping the sheet as the real record. Two sources drift, and at tax time nobody knows which one is right.
- Building reminders with colour rules in the sheet. They only show on the day you open the file.
- Retyping totals from a spreadsheet into bridging software, which GOV.UK does not allow for Making Tax Digital.
- Choosing software on the cheapest monthly price without checking it covers the job you are actually short of, whether that is rent, dates or HMRC.
- Importing every historical tab. Bring in what is current; keep the old sheet as your archive.
Is there a landlord spreadsheet template for the UK?
Many are free to download. LetCompliance’s own import template lists every column it reads, so filling it in gives you both a usable sheet and a file you can import later if you decide software is worth it.
Can I use Excel or Google Sheets for Making Tax Digital?
Yes, with bridging software that reads the sheet through a digital link and sends the updates. The sheet stays your record; the bridging product does the sending.
When would I use software instead of a spreadsheet?
When a job has to happen on a date whether or not you are thinking about it: chasing rent, warning you of a renewal, sending an update. A sheet is a better place to think; software is a better place to be reminded.
Can I get my data back into a spreadsheet if I leave?
Yes. The reports download as CSV or PDF, Finance exports a Xero-ready CSV, and a copy of your data can be downloaded from the account.
The honest limits
- The import takes CSV, not .xlsx, so save a copy as CSV first.
- Past income and expenses do not come from the property sheet. This year’s money comes in from bank statements uploaded as CSV.
- There is no live bank feed and no Xero connection: statements are uploaded, and Finance gives a Xero-ready CSV.
- For one let, paid on time, below the Making Tax Digital threshold, a well-kept spreadsheet is a sound choice, and this page will not pretend otherwise.
