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CSV with the default and other valid Xero VAT codes per estate agency account. Import file and tax-rate list below.
Download chart of accounts (CSV)Also available
An estate agent’s biggest controllable cost is the car, and the second is marketing, and a generic chart handles neither in a way that survives a tax return. This is a UK estate agency chart of accounts built for Xero, with the vehicle handled both ways, marketing broken into the accounts the trade actually uses, and the portal and software costs coded. It ships as a readable reference CSV and a ready-to-import CSV.
The car, two ways
How an agent claims the car sets the tone for the whole return, and there are two methods that must not be mixed on one vehicle. The chart supports both with separate accounts. Motor vehicle expenses holds actual running costs (fuel, insurance, servicing, repairs) coded at standard 20% where VAT applies, for an agent claiming the business-use proportion of real costs. Mileage claims holds the simplified flat-rate claim, coded No VAT, because the 45p-per-mile first-10,000 and 25p-thereafter rates carry no VAT and already bundle in the cost of buying and running the car. Putting both in one account invites the error of claiming the flat rate and depreciation at once, so they are kept apart.
Marketing, split the way agents spend it
After the car, marketing defines the cost base, so the chart breaks it into the accounts an agency recognises: property portal and listing fees for Rightmove, Zoopla, and OnTheMarket; photography, floor plans and video; for-sale boards and signage; and property styling and staging. All are standard-rated, so the VAT coding is simple, but the value is in the split: it lets the agency tie each cost to the instruction it relates to and see which marketing actually returns. Property styling paid to present a listing is a cost of making the sale, distinct from any personal spend, and giving it its own account keeps that clear.
Subscriptions, memberships, and the hospitality trap
Portal and CRM software recurs monthly, and the generic software subscriptions account carries it at standard 20%, with the reverse charge available for any overseas-billed tool. Professional memberships to bodies like Propertymark sit in their own account, defaulting to exempt because many such fees are exempt or outside scope, with standard listed where VAT applies. The trap the chart steers around is client hospitality: taking a vendor to lunch is business entertainment, not deductible and with blocked input VAT, so it belongs in the client entertainment account coded No VAT, never in a marketing or travel line.
Defaults prefill, lines are overridable
Each VAT code is a default Xero prefills onto the transaction line, after the contact and item defaults, and any line can be overridden. The portal and photography accounts defaulting to standard is right for almost all of that spend, and the readable CSV lists the alternative codes where one legitimately applies.
How to use it
- Open the reference CSV and adapt the account names to the agency, keeping the vehicle, marketing, and membership accounts.
- In Xero go to Accounting, then Chart of accounts, then Import, and upload the CSV into a demo organisation first.
- Confirm the standard and exempt rates exist in your org.
- Decide the vehicle method (mileage or actual costs) per car and use the matching account consistently.
The recurring work is a stream of fuel, marketing, and software receipts, often captured between viewings:
- Hubdoc collects recurring portal and software bills into the file.
- ExpenseFlow reads each receipt and supplier invoice from a phone photo or forwarded email, codes it to the right marketing or running-cost account, flags vehicle running costs as needing a business-use split, and posts it into Xero, so the receipt pile in the car does not become a month-end backlog.
- Dext applies supplier rules for repeat marketing suppliers.
For the mileage-versus-actual choice, marketing deductions, and home office in full, see the UK estate agent expenses guide. On QuickBooks instead? See the UK estate agency chart of accounts for QuickBooks. For the codes, see the UK VAT codes in Xero reference.