Charging your company rent for your home office

If you run your business through a limited company and your base of operations is your home office, it is possible to charge your company rent. Of course if you do this the company will be able to deduct the rents from its profits and you will need to declare the rents on your self-assessment return.

On the face of it there would seem to be no advantage. But what if you also have buy to let properties and are making losses?

Very often buy to let property owners have more costs (loan interest etc) than they have rents receivable. Unfortunately it is not possible to set off these rental losses against other income. The losses have to be carried forward to be set against rental profits in future years.

If on the other hand you do charge your company rents for the use of a home office it would be possible to set off any buy to let losses against this income. The rents from your company and your buy to let rents are taxable as property income.

Effectively you would be getting tax relief through your company for the rental losses you personally suffer on your buy to let property. A number of considerations need to be taken into account;

• If you charge your company rents you must have a proper rental agreement between you and your company, otherwise the revenue could seek to treat the rental payments as part of your salary from the company.

1. The rents that you charge for your home office must be charged on a commercial basis. It may be sensible to have a formal valuation undertaken.
2. The rental agreement should state that the office space at home is only available for fixed periods each day. This is necessary to observe the non-exclusive principle. Without this you could jeopardise your principal private residence exemption for capital gains tax purposes.
3. If you have a mortgage, you may need to check with your lender before entering into such an arrangement