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Short let calculator

Whether letting by the night beats letting by the year, honestly

The nightly rate is the easy part. Occupancy is the number that decides it, and the one everybody overstates. Then the cleaning, the linen, the platform commission, the utilities and the council tax or business rates all land on you rather than on a tenant, and the holiday lettings tax regime that used to soften it was abolished in April 2025. This sets both businesses side by side at the occupancy you actually believe in.

For: Serviced accommodation, a holiday let or a short let

Tell us what you are looking forAll calculators
The property and the trade
£
£
Across the whole year including the off season, not the summer rate. Take it from what comparable listings nearby actually charge in February.
%
The number that decides everything, and the one everybody overstates. Conservative projections use 65% to 70% in year one, rising to 75% to 80% in year two once the reviews are there. Serviced apartments across European markets ran around 80% in 2025, and a typical regional holiday let runs nearer 64%.
nt
Shorter stays mean more changeovers, and every changeover is a clean, a laundry run and a set of consumables. At 3 nights that is about 79 a year.
£
The comparison that matters, and the fallback if the short let does not work.
Cost per stay
These scale with changeovers rather than with nights, which is why short stays are so much less profitable than they look.
%
About 3% listing on your own site, 15% to 18% through the major booking platforms, and more through a travel agent. Direct bookings are the single biggest margin lever available.
%
Short let agents charge far more than long let ones: one London agent publishes 26% plus VAT, which is 31.2%. At zero, budget for the fact that you are on call for every check-in.
£
£
£
Coffee, toiletries, cleaning products, the welcome pack and everything that walks out of the door.
Cost per year
£
All yours, and guests do not turn the heating down. Budget above what you would pay living there.
Rates or council tax?
A property available to let for 140 nights a year and actually let for 70 in England is assessed for business rates rather than council tax. Below a £12,000 rateable value small business relief usually wipes the bill out entirely, which is the single biggest tax advantage a short let has left.
£
Small business relief means nothing to pay up to £12,000 and a taper to £15,000. At this rateable value the bill is £0 a year on the 38.2p retail, hospitality and leisure multiplier.
%
Higher than a tenancy: fifty different households a year is fifty chances for something to break.
£
Short let cover with public liability. A standard landlord policy does not cover paying guests and will decline the claim.
£
Everything from beds to the cutlery. It is capital rather than a running cost, and it is spread across its life below.
yr
Short lets wear furniture out three or four times faster than a tenancy. Five years is realistic, and the annual charge is what most projections leave out entirely.
Finance
%
A standard buy to let mortgage does not permit short letting, and doing it anyway is a breach of the mortgage conditions. It needs a holiday let product, from a much shorter list of lenders.
%
Holiday let products price about 0.5 to 1 point above a standard buy to let, and are sized on a blended low, medium and high season rent rather than on a single figure.
What a short let costs you against a tenancy-£1,399 a year£27,284 of gross income at 65% occupancy, of which 27% survives to the bottom line. A tenancy on the same property nets £8,743 for a fraction of the work. It stops paying below 72% occupancy, which is 262 nights a year.
3.2%Net yield
3.8%As a tenancy
72%Break-even occupancy
79Changeovers a year
Net to you27%Platform and agent15%Changeovers26%Utilities and rates10%Other22%
The short let
Gross income£27,284
237 nights let at £115. Revenue per available night, which is how the trade actually measures it, is £75.
Platform and agent£4,093
15.0% of gross. Moving bookings direct is worth £3,274 a year here.
Changeovers£6,959
79 a year at £88 each. Raising the minimum stay by one night would save about £1,740.
Utilities and rates£2,760
Small business rate relief covers the rates entirely at this rateable value, which is worth having and worth checking annually.
Maintenance and insurance£3,328
Furniture, written down£2,800
£14,000 across 5 years. Leaving this out is the commonest way a short let projection flatters itself.
Net income£7,343
A 3.2% net yield, and a 27% margin on gross.
The same property on a tenancy
Gross rent£13,200
Running costs£4,457
Agent, maintenance, four weeks of void, insurance and certificates. The tenant pays every bill and there are no changeovers.
Net income, tenancy£8,743
A 3.8% net yield.
The number to remember
Break-even occupancy72%
262 nights a year. Below that the tenancy earns more for a fraction of the work. You are modelling 65%, which is 7% below it.
Contribution per night let£57
What one more booked night adds, after commission and the share of the changeover it carries. Multiply by the nights you are unsure about.
Occupancy 15 points lower£4,227
Behind the tenancy in a bad year. A new listing without reviews spends its first season here, so plan for it rather than hoping past it.
Clear after the mortgage-£2,719
-£227 a month against -£110 on a tenancy.
Where these figures come from

Occupancy. Serviced apartments across most European markets ran around 80% in 2025. Conservative projections for a new operation use 65% to 70% in year one and 75% to 80% in year two. A typical regional UK holiday let market such as Frome runs about 64% at £136 a night. Knight Frank put regional serviced apartment margins at 39.5% for 2025.

Commission. About 3% listing on your own site and 15% to 18% through the major booking platforms. One London short let agent publishes management at 26% plus VAT, which is 31.2%.

Rates. In England, a property available to let for 140 nights and actually let for 70 is assessed for business rates rather than council tax. The 2026/27 retail, hospitality and leisure multiplier is 38.2p, with small business relief giving 100% relief to a £12,000 rateable value and tapering to £15,000.

Tax. The furnished holiday lettings regime ended on 1 April 2025 for corporation tax and 6 April 2025 for income tax and capital gains tax. Short let income is now taxed as ordinary property income, which means the Section 24 mortgage interest restriction applies to it too.

Before income tax. The furnished holiday lettings regime was abolished in April 2025, so the capital allowances, the full mortgage interest deduction and the capital gains reliefs that used to make this attractive have all gone; short let income is now taxed as ordinary property income and the Section 24 restriction applies. A short let may need planning consent, particularly in London where the ninety night rule applies and in Scotland where a licence is mandatory, and it will usually breach both a standard buy to let mortgage condition and a residential lease. Business rates on short lets have been flagged as a coming pressure. This is a hospitality business with a property attached, and the figure at the bottom of it is a wage as much as a yield. An estimate, not advice.

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