One of the UK's biggest lettings groups has become the latest to move into tax compliance, rolling out Making Tax Digital software to more than 73,000 managed landlords as the industry's role expands beyond rent collection and property management.

While Making Tax Digital (MTD) has traditionally been viewed as an issue for accountants and landlords, the latest move by LRG suggests letting agents are increasingly positioning themselves at the centre of compliance.

The group, which operates more than 300 branches under brands including Leaders, Romans, Stirling Ackroyd, Gibbs Gillespie, Chancellors and Manning Stainton, has selected Nexus by Landlord Studio as its sole MTD platform for landlords in its managed portfolio.

LRG's Chief Lettings Officer Allison Thompson says the group wanted a solution designed specifically for agent-managed portfolios that would allow landlords to meet HMRC's reporting requirements without changing the way their properties are managed.

The software links directly to letting agent systems, pulling together rental income, management fees, expenses and property records into an HMRC-compliant digital record. The aim is to reduce the need for landlords to manually recreate figures from rental statements before making quarterly submissions.

The timing is significant. Since April this year, landlords earning more than £50,000 have been required to comply with Making Tax Digital for Income Tax Self-Assessment. The threshold drops to £30,000 in April 2027 and then to £20,000 a year later, bringing tens of thousands more landlords into the regime.

For many landlords using managing agents, much of the information needed for MTD is already held by their agent. As a result, the focus is shifting from landlords maintaining separate spreadsheets to agencies offering integrated compliance tools alongside their management services.

Logan Ransley, Managing Director of Nexus by Landlord Studio, says the partnership reflects that change, arguing that rental data already exists within agency systems and should flow directly into tax reporting rather than being recreated every quarter.

The agreement is one of the largest single MTD software rollouts announced so far within the private rented sector and underlines the growing commercial opportunity around tax compliance as landlords adapt to HMRC's digital reporting requirements.

For landlords, the wider message is that Making Tax Digital is becoming more than an accounting exercise. As the regime expands over the next two years, agents are likely to play an increasingly important role in helping clients meet their legal obligations, with integrated compliance services rapidly becoming another feature of the full management offer.

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