About us

One sector, properly understood

Most accountants can produce a set of estate agency accounts. Far fewer can tell you which of the two client money regimes you are in, whether regulation 8(1) requires your account to be audited this year, what regulation 6(3) says your records must actually contain, or why HMRC's published letting agency threshold contradicts the legislation it is supposed to describe.

We are a trading style of Buzz Accounting Ltd, a UK accountancy practice.

What we will not do

We do not sign the client account report. Regulation 8(1) requires a qualified auditor, defined by EAA 1979 s.14(6)–(7) as someone eligible for appointment as a statutory auditor under the Companies Act 2006. We are not, so we do the preparation and refer the report to a registered audit firm.
We do not give legal advice. Redress scheme membership, tenancy drafting, possession proceedings and consumer law compliance are for your solicitor and your redress scheme.
We do not publish valuation multiples. HMRC publishes none for this sector, in the Capital Gains Manual or anywhere else, and we will not repeat somebody's market opinion as though it were a verifiable fact.

Worth knowingThe first thing we look at is always which regime you are in. It is a five-minute conversation that decides whether you need a CMP scheme, whether an audit is due within six months of your period end, and which set of penalties a Trading Standards officer would be working from. A surprising number of agencies have never had it.

How we work

Remote-first, across the United Kingdom, and carefully across it. Client Money Protection, the Tenant Fees Act and the Renters' Rights Act tenancy reforms are England only. Wales has its own Act, which is criminal from the outset rather than civil-first. The Estate Agents Act reaches England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and in Scotland section 13(2) holds clients' money as agent rather than on trust. Where something does not carry across a border we say so rather than leaving you to find out.

Who does what

We do the accounting. A registered auditor signs the report.

Accountants for Estate Agents

Client account bookkeeping and the monthly three-way reconciliation. The records reg 6(3) actually prescribes — payer, capacity held, the interest in land, tracked separately by property. The agency's annual accounts, corporation tax or partnership return, payroll, VAT and the management figures you run the business on. All the preparation that decides whether the report comes back clean.

Buzz Accounting Ltd is licensed by the AAT and a member of the ICPA. It is not a chartered accountancy firm and not a registered auditor.

Anstey Bond LLP

Colin Ellis, ICAEW and a Responsible Individual, audits the client account and signs the report. Regulation 8(1) of the Estate Agents (Accounts) Regulations 1981 requires a qualified auditor, and EAA 1979 s.14(6)–(7) defines that as someone eligible for appointment as a statutory auditor under the Companies Act 2006. Propertymark says the same thing for its own Accountant’s Report, citing Companies Act 2006 s.1239.

Anstey Bond LLP is a separate firm, registered for audit by the ICAEW. Companies House OC360626.