Convert farm buildings to holiday accommodation

Turning a barn or outbuilding into holiday accommodation is a change of use, so it needs planning, building regulations and fire safety sorted before you let it. It also changes how the building is rated and taxed.

Get planning permission

Your local planning authority decides whether the conversion needs planning permission and whether letting the building to short-stay guests needs permission too. Ask it before you spend money on plans, and make sure you know whether the building is listed or sits in a designated area, because that closes off most shortcuts.

Meet the building regulations

Converting a building into a dwelling, or into a hotel or boarding house, is a material change of use under the Building Regulations 2010. The building must then meet the listed requirements, including means of warning and escape, internal and external fire spread, ventilation, hot and cold water, sanitary facilities, drainage, combustion appliances, electrical safety and conservation of fuel and power. Where the change is to a dwelling or boarding house, the requirements on structure, resistance to contaminants and moisture and sound insulation can apply too. Apply to local authority building control or use a registered approved inspector, and get a completion certificate before guests stay.

Make the building safe from fire

Guests sleeping in your building are the public, so the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 applies. You are the responsible person and you must carry out and keep up to date a fire risk assessment. GOV.UK publishes a guide for small self-catering accommodation with a simple layout and a guide for larger or more complex premises. Gas appliances and electrical installations also need to meet HSE guidance on safety for landlords.

Work out the business rates

A converted farm building is no longer an exempt farm building. Whether it pays business rates or council tax depends on how much of the year it is available to let and actually let.

Count the tax and inheritance tax effects

The furnished holiday lettings tax regime ended on 6 April 2025, so income from holiday accommodation is taxed under the usual residential landlord rules. Letting income is property income, separate from your farming profits, so keep separate records and apportion shared costs, such as an access track or utilities, on a reasonable basis.

Agricultural Relief for Inheritance Tax covers property owned and occupied for agricultural purposes immediately before a transfer. A building let to holiday guests no longer meets that test, so its value may fall outside the relief.

Tell your insurer

A farm policy is unlikely to cover guests. GOV.UK recommends dedicated holiday let insurance, public liability cover and buildings and contents cover suited to short-term letting. If you employ cleaners or maintenance staff you also need employers' liability insurance.

Enforcement and penalties

Converting or using a building without the planning permission or prior approval it needs is a breach of planning control. The breach is not itself a criminal offence. Instead, the local planning authority can serve an enforcement notice requiring you to stop the use or reverse the work. If the notice has not been complied with once the compliance period ends and no appeal is outstanding, the owner of the land commits an offence. So does anyone else with control of or an interest in the land who carries on the activity the notice requires to stop. The fine is unlimited, and the court must take into account any financial benefit from the breach (Town and Country Planning Act 1990, section 179).

Building work that contravenes the building regulations is an offence under section 35 of the Building Act 1984. It carries an unlimited fine and up to 2 years in prison on indictment: in England since 1 October 2023 and in Wales since 1 July 2026.

Once you take paying guests, the responsible person (usually the owner or letting agent) must comply with the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, which the local fire and rescue authority enforces. Failing to carry out a fire safety duty in a way that puts guests at risk of death or serious injury, or ignoring an enforcement or prohibition notice, carries an unlimited fine and up to 2 years in prison on indictment (article 32).