A letting agent's website shows homes to let, and it also carries things the law puts there: the fees list, the scheme details that go with it and, since 1 May 2026 in England, one stated rent on every listing for a private letting. A landlord that lets its own homes shares most of the advert rules. Each section below gives the rule and its source.
The fees list the law puts on your website
In England, a letting agent's fees are published on its own website. The Consumer Rights Act 2015 says "The agent must publish a list of the fees on the agent's website (if it has a website)" (section 83). The list describes each fee well enough for the person paying it to understand what it covers, says for a fee a tenant pays whether it is per property or per tenant, and gives the amount "inclusive of any applicable tax", or how the fee is calculated where the amount cannot be set in advance.
With the list goes a statement naming your redress scheme and, if you hold client money, your client money protection scheme. Where that scheme issues a certificate, the Client Money Protection Regulations 2019 add that you "publish a copy of the certificate on the agent's website (if any)". When you advertise on a portal or on Facebook, the list, or a link to the page that holds it, must be there too (section 83(3C)). The fees duty carries a penalty of up to £5,000, and local Trading Standards enforce it.
One rent on every listing
Since 1 May 2026, in England, for a home to be let on an assured tenancy, the Renters' Rights Act 2025 says a landlord or agent "must not advertise in writing, or otherwise offer in writing, the proposed letting unless" the rent is "a specific amount" and the advert "states the proposed rent" (section 56). You may not invite or encourage an offer above that rent, or accept one. The government's guidance for councils counts "an online property advert" and "a social media post" as written adverts, and says agents and landlords must not "publish a price range". The penalty is up to £7,000.
Our build standard: one rent field for each listing, shown wherever the listing appears, and no feature that asks for offers.
Adverts that turn tenants away
From the same date, for the same lettings, a landlord or agent may not, because a child would or may live with or visit the tenant, or because someone is or may be a benefits claimant, stop them asking about a home, finding out about it, viewing it or renting it, or apply a rule that makes them less likely to rent it (sections 33 and 34). For children only, the rule does not apply where the landlord or agent can show the conduct is "a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim". These sections do not stop you taking income into account to judge whether someone can afford the rent (section 41).
Sections 33 and 34 do not say what an advert may say. GOV.UK's guide for landlords gives the example of an advert "specifically stating no children are allowed" and says the landlord and the letting agent "are both legally responsible"; the Explanatory Notes give "Posting a 'No DSS' Advert" as an example; and the guide says affordability checks "must include income from benefits in the same way as other income". The penalty is up to £7,000. On a website this goes beyond wording: our build standard keeps every search filter, enquiry form and application form free of anything that screens out tenants with children or on benefits.
What a tenant may be asked to pay
In England, the Tenant Fees Act 2019 lists the payments a landlord or agent may ask a tenant for and bans the rest. The list includes rent, a tenancy deposit of up to five weeks' rent (six where the annual rent is £50,000 or more), a holding deposit of up to one week's rent, a payment for a lost key where the tenancy agreement provides for it, at a reasonable cost with written evidence, and a change to the tenancy that the tenant asks for, at £50 or reasonable costs if higher. Since 1 May 2026, rent payable before the tenancy is entered into is a banned payment for an assured tenancy, and a landlord or agent must not "invite or encourage" it. After signing, the Housing Act 1988 (section 4B, added by the Renters' Rights Act) makes a term for rent in advance of no effect, apart from the initial rent. GOV.UK: "You can ask for a maximum of 1 month's rent in advance after you and your tenant have signed the tenancy agreement and before the tenancy start date." A listing that asks for months of rent upfront would, on our reading, ask for more than these rules allow.
A tenant may also ask to keep a pet, and the landlord's consent "is not to be unreasonably refused" (Housing Act 1988 section 16A, in force since 1 May 2026). A landlord may not require a tenant to buy insurance from a third party, so our build standard shows no compulsory pet insurance and no pet fee, and says that pet requests are considered.
Coming next: the database and the ombudsman
As at 26 October 2026, two parts of the Act that reach your adverts are not yet in force. The first is the private rented sector database. Section 82, once in force, requires "the unique identifiers allocated by the database operator" for the landlord and the property in any written advert. The draft regulations were laid on 9 September 2026. The government says its landlord registration service, "an important first step toward establishing" the database, will launch on 15 December 2026 in the West Midlands and reach other areas over 12 months, and that the identifiers will need to go on adverts once the public interface rolls out "under future legislation", with "further guidance" first. The second is membership of the Landlord Ombudsman, which the government's roadmap expects to require of landlords in 2028. Our build standard: listing fields ready for both identifiers, shown only once the rule applies.
In Scotland the numbers are already on adverts: a registered landlord's advert carries the landlord registration number, and a letting agent's adverts and website carry its letting agent registration number.
Listings, entered once
If your listings live in property software that sends them to the portals, and it offers a feed or an API for your own website, we build the site to read it, so a listing is entered once and your site shows what the feed carries. Access to an API can carry its own charge from the vendor, and that charge stays theirs. We do not send listings to the portals.
What a listing shows is partly the law's decision. The Energy Performance of Buildings (England and Wales) Regulations 2012 say that, where a home has a valid EPC, its rating must be "stated in any advertisement of the sale or rental in commercial media", which the government's guide says includes the internet, so the listing for such a home shows the EPC rating. Since the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations were revoked on 6 April 2025, misleading listings fall under the DMCC Act 2024: leaving out information a tenant needs to decide can be unfair, and a listing that shows a rent omits material information if it leaves out, where the context does not make it clear, the main characteristics, the total price, or the identity and business address of the business offering it. National Trading Standards' material information page no longer carries its guidance, and the government has said it will return to the possibility of guidance for letting agents "at a later stage".
If you let your own homes
A landlord that lets its own homes, as the made-up landlord in the example below does, shares most of these rules: in England, the Renters' Rights Act's advert rules, the Tenant Fees Act and the EPC rule apply to landlords as well as agents. The fees-list duty sits with letting agents. On our reading it does not reach a landlord letting its own homes, though no source we read says so in terms. If an agent markets your homes, the fees list is the agent's, and GOV.UK's guide says the landlord and the agent are both legally responsible for an advert that turns tenants away.
What we build
- The website. Websites: five pages for a fixed fee, to WCAG 2.2 AA, checked automatically as the site is built and by a manual keyboard pass before launch. Listings from your property software's feed or API are quoted in the written scope.
- The fees page. Your fees as your schedule sets them, with the scheme statements and the certificate, linked from every page and ready to link from portal listings.
- Listings. One rent for each listing, the EPC rating where the home has one, the deposits as your software sends them, and fields ready for the database identifiers.
- Enquiries and viewings. CRM & Follow-up: enquiries and viewing requests in one system, with forms that ask nothing that screens out tenants with children or on benefits.
- Search and reviews. SEO for the searches tenants and landlords make in your area, Review Management, and Google Business Profile management for an office that meets its customers.
- Missed calls. Missed-Call Text-Back: one text when a call goes unanswered, from a line on the platform. On a lettings line, our standard text also gives your out-of-hours number for urgent repairs.
On a hosted plan your callers' and customers' names, numbers and messages are processed for you under a written contract, on a platform whose data does not stay in the UK.
What we are not
We are not Trading Standards, a redress scheme or a solicitor. Our build standard is written to respect the rules above. That is a specialisation. It is not advice, and no substitute for it. Anything that could cost you a penalty, a scheme membership or a dispute belongs with someone qualified to advise on it.
Where to next
Start with a free site audit: five prioritised findings on search, speed and conversion, as a recorded walkthrough of your own pages and a one-page summary, within three working days of your request unless our reply gives a later date. It does not check the site against lettings law, and the findings are yours whether or not you work with us. The website examples show five sites we have built for made-up businesses, one of them a landlord. Starting figures are on our pricing page.
