For property investors and developers, 2026 is not a year to cruise through on autopilot. A cluster of tax changes, a new digital reporting obligation, and some genuinely significant regulatory shifts in the residential development sector have all landed — or are landing — in a short window. Some of these were trailed years ago; others crept up with less fanfare than they deserved.

In our experience working with landlords, portfolio investors, and developers across Greater Manchester and beyond, the clients who feel most in control are those who dealt with changes like this six months before the deadline, not six days after it. So we’ve pulled together the changes we think are most likely to catch people out — and what we’d suggest doing about each one.

If you are a landlord with gross property income above £50,000 a year, Making Tax Digital for Income Tax (MTD for IT) applied to you from 6 April 2026. That is not a soft launch or a pilot — it is a live obligation, and HMRC expects quarterly digital submissions through compatible software rather than a single annual Self Assessment return.

This is a bigger shift than it might sound. Many landlords we speak to have been running their finances through spreadsheets or handing a box of bank statements to their accountant once a year. That approach no longer meets the requirement. You now need cloud-based bookkeeping that keeps records in real time and can submit quarterly updates directly to HMRC.

The threshold drops further in April 2027, pulling in landlords with income above £30,000. So if you are just below the current threshold, it is worth getting your record-keeping into shape now rather than rushing to comply in 12 months’ time.

If you are not sure whether you are in scope — particularly if your income sits close to the boundary, or you have income from both a trade and property — this is exactly the kind of thing worth clarifying with an accountant now rather than after HMRC sends a nudge letter.

For property investors thinking about disposals in 2026, the capital gains tax picture has shifted. While residential property gains remain subject to the 18% and 24% rates (for basic and higher-rate taxpayers respectively), the position for those selling development land or commercial property used in a business has changed at the margins.

Business Asset Disposal Relief and Investors’ Relief — both of which can reduce CGT on qualifying disposals — now attract a rate of 18% from April 2026, up from 14%. That is still meaningfully lower than the standard CGT rates, but investors who were factoring in the old rate when modelling an exit will need to revisit those projections.

Dividend tax rates have also increased by 2% from April 2026. For property investors who hold assets through a limited company and extract profits as dividends, that changes the after-tax yield calculation and may prompt a review of how income is structured.

None of this necessarily changes a fundamental investment decision, but if you have been sitting on a disposal or thinking about restructuring your company, it is worth modelling the current numbers rather than relying on figures you worked out before the Budget.

For residential developers, one of the most significant new costs arriving this year is the Building Safety Levy. From 1 October 2026, most new residential developments of ten or more dwellings will be subject to this charge, calculated per square metre of floor area. The levy is designed to help fund remediation of buildings with unsafe cladding, and while the intent is understandable, the cost is real and needs to be factored into development appraisals.

If you are currently appraising a site or partway through a scheme, and you have not yet modelled the levy into your numbers, we would strongly encourage doing so before you commit to any further spend. Schemes that looked viable at one margin may look different with this added layer of cost — particularly at a time when build costs have already been under pressure.

The levy sits alongside already-significant compliance costs introduced by the Building Safety Act 2022, including more demanding Gateway 2 requirements that have extended timelines and added cost for developers working on higher-risk buildings. Gateway 3 — the sign-off required before a higher-risk building can be occupied — also remains a material risk to programme if your building safety documentation is not in order well ahead of practical completion.

Beyond the levy, 2026 brings a number of regulatory changes that affect the physical design and compliance requirements of residential schemes.

Dual staircase requirement

From 30 September 2026, all new residential buildings exceeding 18 metres in height must have two separate staircases. For schemes currently in design or planning, this is not a minor tweak — it affects floor-plate efficiency, unit count, and potentially the entire viability of a tall residential scheme. Developers with buildings at planning or pre-application stage should be reviewing this with their architects and project managers now.

Remediation obligations and criminal liability

A proposed Remediation Bill — which is expected to progress through Parliament — would impose a legal duty on landlords to complete building safety remediation works within defined timeframes. Non-compliance would carry the risk of criminal prosecution. While the bill has not yet received Royal Assent, the direction of travel is clear, and landlords with buildings affected by cladding or structural safety issues should be taking professional advice now rather than waiting for legislation to land.

The combination of levy costs, stricter design requirements, and extended compliance timelines means that development appraisals completed even 12 months ago may need revisiting from the ground up.

One question we get asked regularly by property investors and developers is whether to hold property personally or through a limited company. The honest answer is that it genuinely depends — and the 2026 changes add a few more variables to work through.

For investors building a portfolio, the limited company route continues to attract attention because corporation tax rates remain lower than the higher rates of income tax, and retained profits inside a company can be reinvested more tax-efficiently. But the 2% increase in dividend tax rates from April 2026 narrows the advantage slightly when it comes to extracting those profits as income.

For developers, the picture is different again — development activity typically attracts income tax treatment rather than CGT, which affects how profits are taxed regardless of structure.

There is no universal answer, and we are cautious of any adviser who offers one. What we can say is that getting the structure right at the outset — and reviewing it as your portfolio grows — tends to produce meaningfully better outcomes over time than restructuring reactively. If you are considering your first development, expanding a portfolio, or thinking about whether your current structure still makes sense, a conversation with an accountant who works with property clients regularly is the place to start. You can find more on this in our post on self-employed vs limited company.