Let your home or a room as a short-term holiday let

Use this guide if you want to host paying guests for a few nights at a time, either in a spare room or by letting your whole home while you are away. It is for short stays, not a live-in lodger – for that, see our guide 'Take in a lodger safely and legally'. Have your mortgage terms or lease, your home insurance policy and a floor plan or sketch of your home ready. This is general information, not legal or tax advice.

Step by step

1. Check the rules where you live

   In Greater London, you can let your home for short stays (under 90 consecutive nights each) for no more than 90 nights in total in a calendar year without planning permission, and you must be the person paying council tax there; going over needs planning permission. The limit is aimed at letting the whole home; hosting guests in a spare room while you live there is not normally counted towards it. In Scotland you need a short-term let licence from your council before hosting, including for a room in your own home. In Wales, anyone taking paying bookings of 31 nights or less, including for a spare room in their main home, must join the Welsh Government's visitor accommodation register by 31 March 2027, and some Welsh councils may add a visitor levy per night. England is setting up a national short-term let register that the government has said will be running by March 2027, with full details of who must register still to be confirmed, and Northern Ireland has its own tourism certification rules – check GOV.UK, GOV.WALES or your council for the latest position before you list. Outside London, occasionally letting your own home normally does not need planning permission, but frequent whole-home letting can amount to a change of use, so ask your council's planning team if you plan to host most weeks of the year.