A newly incorporated property SPV has four filing obligations in its first cycle, and they run on three different clocks:
- First statutory accounts: 21 months from the date of incorporation, to Companies House.
- Company tax return (CT600): 12 months from the end of the accounting period, to HMRC.
- Corporation tax payment: 9 months and 1 day from the end of the accounting period, to HMRC.
- Confirmation statement: within 14 days of the end of each 12-month review period, to Companies House.
The trap is not any single deadline. It is that the four are anchored to different starting points. Your accounts deadline counts from the day the company was incorporated. Your tax deadlines count from the end of an accounting period that may not even share its end date with your Companies House year end. And the corporation tax money is due about three months before the return that works out how much it is. First-time SPV directors who assume one year end and one deadline usually discover the mismatch when a payment reminder arrives for a return they have not started.
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The four deadlines at a glance
This table is the whole page in one place. Everything after it explains what changes in specific situations.
| Filing | Deadline | Anchor point | Where filed |
|---|---|---|---|
| First statutory accounts | 21 months | From date of incorporation | Companies House |
| Subsequent statutory accounts | 9 months | From end of accounting reference period | Companies House |
| Company tax return (CT600) | 12 months | From end of accounting period | HMRC |
| Corporation tax payment | 9 months and 1 day | From end of accounting period | HMRC |
| Confirmation statement | Within 14 days of review period end | From incorporation, then from the last statement | Companies House |
The 21-month rule for first accounts sits in section 441 of the Companies Act 2006 and the 9-month rule for every year afterwards in section 442. The longer first window is not a concession, it exists because the first accounting reference period normally runs for more than twelve months: Companies House sets your default year end as the last day of the month in which the first anniversary of incorporation falls.
One phrase does a lot of work in that table. Your accounting reference period is the Companies House concept that ends on your accounting reference date. Your accounting period is the HMRC concept, and it can never exceed twelve months. When the first Companies House period is longer than a year, HMRC splits it into a full twelve-month accounting period plus a short stub, and each one gets its own return and its own payment date. That single split is where most of the first-year confusion comes from.
Worked example: an SPV incorporated on 14 September 2026
Take an illustrative single-property SPV incorporated on 14 September 2026, which buys a flat in January 2027 and lets it from March 2027. Companies House sets the default accounting reference date at 30 September 2027, the last day of the month containing the first anniversary. The first accounting reference period therefore runs 14 September 2026 to 30 September 2027, which is twelve and a half months, so HMRC splits it in two.
| Event or filing | Date | Why that date |
|---|---|---|
| Incorporation | 14 Sep 2026 | Certificate of incorporation issued |
| Default accounting reference date set | 30 Sep 2027 | Last day of the month of the first anniversary |
| First confirmation statement due | 27 Sep 2027 | Review period ends 13 Sep 2027, plus 14 days |
| First HMRC accounting period ends | 13 Sep 2027 | Twelve months maximum from incorporation |
| Stub accounting period ends | 30 Sep 2027 | Remainder up to the accounting reference date |
| Corporation tax payable, main period | 14 Jun 2028 | 9 months and 1 day after 13 Sep 2027 |
| First statutory accounts due | 14 Jun 2028 | 21 months from incorporation |
| Corporation tax payable, stub period | 1 Jul 2028 | 9 months and 1 day after 30 Sep 2027 |
| CT600 due, main period | 13 Sep 2028 | 12 months after 13 Sep 2027 |
| CT600 due, stub period | 30 Sep 2028 | 12 months after 30 Sep 2027 |
| Second statutory accounts due | 30 Jun 2029 | 9 months after the 30 Sep 2028 year end |
Read the two June 2028 rows together. The accounts and the first corporation tax payment land on the same day here purely by arithmetic coincidence, but the returns that calculate that tax are not due for another fifteen months. Nothing stops you filing everything early, and for a company this simple that is usually the sensible course: prepare one set of accounts, split the tax computation across the two periods, pay by 14 June and file both returns at the same time.
Two SPVs incorporated a fortnight apart can therefore have year ends a month apart and payment dates a month apart. There is no estate-wide April or December deadline for companies. Your calendar is generated by your own incorporation date, which is also why the year end is worth thinking about deliberately rather than accepting by default. Whether to move it, and what that does to your tax position, is covered in our guide to changing a buy-to-let company's year-end date.
Has the SPV bought a property yet? What changes if it has not
This is the most common real question from newly incorporated landlords, usually phrased as whether a property SPV counts as dormant if it is not rented out yet. Letting is not the test. The test is whether the company has had any significant accounting transaction in the period.
A company is dormant for Companies House purposes when no significant accounting transaction has been entered in its accounting records during the financial year. The narrow exceptions are the payment for shares taken by the subscribers on formation, and certain Companies House fees such as the confirmation statement fee and a fee for changing the company name. Almost everything else counts, including:
- a mortgage arrangement, broker or valuation fee paid from the company account;
- a solicitor's payment on account for the purchase;
- the deposit moving out of the company's bank account;
- bank interest credited on the company's balance;
- any rent received, at which point the question is settled.
So an SPV incorporated in September, sitting empty while the director shops for a mortgage, and which has spent nothing from its own account, is dormant and files dormant accounts. An SPV that has exchanged, paid a valuation fee or drawn down a loan is not dormant, even if no tenant has ever set foot in the property and the company made a loss. An unlet property does not make a company dormant; an unspent bank account does. The full filing mechanics, including which pages you actually submit, are in our guide to filing dormant accounts.
Two points people miss. Dormancy is assessed period by period, so a company can file dormant accounts for its first period and ordinary accounts for its second without anything special happening in between. And dormant does not mean exempt: the accounts deadline, the penalties for missing it and the confirmation statement obligation all apply in full to a dormant company.
What an SPV accountant actually files, and what micro-entity accounts mean
For a small property SPV the annual pack is shorter than most first-time directors expect. It is a set of statutory accounts for Companies House, a full set of accounts plus a corporation tax computation and a CT600 for HMRC, and a confirmation statement. That is the whole of it for a straightforward single-property company with no employees.
Most landlord SPVs qualify as micro-entities and prepare accounts under FRS 105, the accounting standard written for the smallest companies. In practice that means a short balance sheet plus a handful of notes, with no directors' report and no revaluation of the property to market value: investment property stays at cost under FRS 105. Small companies that sit above the micro-entity thresholds use FRS 102 instead, where investment property is normally carried at fair value and the resulting deferred tax has to be recognised. That is a presentational difference rather than a tax one, but it changes how your balance sheet reads to a lender.
The public filing is also thinner than the full accounts. A small company can file filleted accounts, omitting the profit and loss account from the version that appears on the public register at Companies House. Your rental income and profit are therefore not visible to a searcher, though the property, the mortgage and the director's loan on the balance sheet are. HMRC receives the complete accounts with the tax return either way, so filleting is about public disclosure and nothing else.
Corporation tax registration is only half automatic. Incorporating online triggers HMRC to issue the company's unique taxpayer reference without you asking, but that is not the same as being registered for corporation tax: the company must separately tell HMRC it is active, within three months of starting to do business, which for an SPV usually means completion on its first purchase. For the detail of that step and what HMRC expects from a new company, see registering for UK corporation tax and the incorporation walkthrough in how to set up a property investment company.
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The confirmation statement in your filing calendar
The confirmation statement is the one filing that has nothing to do with money. It confirms that the public record for the company is still accurate: registered office, directors, people with significant control, shareholders, share capital and SIC code. It is filed at Companies House annually, and the deadline is 14 days after the end of each 12-month review period, with the first review period running from the date of incorporation.
The fee is £50 filed online and £110 on paper (using form CS01), payable once in each twelve-month payment period however many statements you file in it. For context, incorporation itself costs £100 online or £124 on paper, and the wider cost picture is set out in our SPV formation cost guide.
Calendar point worth planning around: the confirmation statement deadline almost never coincides with your accounts deadline. In the worked example above it falls in September 2027, nine months before the first accounts are due in June 2028. Directors who assume "annual filing" means one event a year miss it, and unlike a late set of accounts there is no automatic financial penalty, just the more serious risk of the registrar starting strike-off action against a company whose record has gone stale.
How you actually complete and file it, including what to do when details have changed, is covered in full in our guide to confirmation statements. The 2024 reforms that added the lawful purposes statement and the registered email address are covered in the confirmation statement changes from 2024 onwards. If you are prompted for identity verification while filing, that is the regime that has applied to newly appointed directors and people with significant control since 18 November 2025, and it is a separate obligation from the statement itself.
Corporation tax: what your SPV will actually pay
Rental profit inside a company is charged to corporation tax, not income tax, so the section 24 finance-cost restriction does not apply and mortgage interest is deducted in full. For 2026/27 the rates are unchanged: 19 per cent where augmented profits are £50,000 or less, 25 per cent where they reach £250,000 or more, and marginal relief tapering the band in between so that profits in that range are effectively taxed at about 26.5 per cent at the margin. Most single-property SPVs sit comfortably in the 19 per cent band in their first cycle, particularly after mortgage interest and the capital-allowances position on any fixtures.
One structural point matters for anyone running more than one company. The £50,000 and £250,000 thresholds are divided by the number of associated companies, so a landlord with four SPVs sees the small profits limit fall to £12,500 in each of them, and profits above that start attracting marginal relief. Four SPVs earning £20,000 each pay noticeably more tax than one SPV earning £80,000. The detail sits in our guides to corporation tax rates for property companies and marginal relief for property companies.
On timing, remember the order from the table: the tax is due 9 months and 1 day after the accounting period ends, and the return is due three months later still. HMRC pays a small amount of credit interest on corporation tax paid early, so there is no penalty for settling as soon as the figures are known. Interest runs against you from the day after the payment date if you are late, whether or not the return has been filed.
ATED: does it apply to your SPV
The Annual Tax on Enveloped Dwellings applies where a company holds a single UK residential dwelling worth more than £500,000. A standard buy-to-let SPV letting to unconnected tenants on a commercial basis will normally qualify for relief even where the value is above the threshold, but the relief must be claimed on a return, so an in-scope company still files. The ATED return is due at the start of the chargeable period rather than after it, which is the opposite convention from every other deadline on this page. Full bands, reliefs and dates are in our ATED guide.
DIY or an accountant: what most SPV directors actually do
The realistic split for a single-property SPV is that the director handles the confirmation statement, and often the dormant accounts for a pre-purchase first period, and an accountant handles everything from the first trading period onwards.
The reason is not difficulty, it is format and consistency. Dormant accounts for a company with nothing in it are a short online form. Trading accounts are not: the accounts, the corporation tax computation and the CT600 have to agree with each other, the return has to be filed in iXBRL rather than as a document, and the treatment of the director's loan account, mortgage arrangement fees and any fixtures in the property all feed the tax figure. Filing fees for a first-year SPV are modest against the cost of a mis-stated director's loan or a missed capital allowances claim on fixtures.
If you do file yourself, the two mistakes that cost real money are missing the 21-month first-accounts deadline (an automatic penalty from £150 rising to £1,500, doubled if you were also late the year before) and paying corporation tax by the CT600 deadline rather than the payment deadline, which quietly accrues interest for three months. Both are calendar failures rather than accounting failures, which is why the calendar comes first on this page.
For the wider picture of running a property company, from structure and share classes through to extraction and eventual sale, start at our SPV company hub.
Sources: Companies Act 2006 s.441 and s.442 (accounts filing periods); gov.uk, first company accounts and return; gov.uk, dormant companies; gov.uk, confirmation statements; HMRC guidance on marginal relief; gov.uk, ATED basics.