Your spreadsheet can't keep up anymore
Every UK landlord starts with a spreadsheet. Somewhere between 4 and 25 properties it quietly stops working — broken formulas, missed rent, receipts everywhere. Here's the spreadsheet alternative built for that moment, and how to switch without re-typing a thing.
Keep your history · import your file as-is · built by active landlords.
Keep the history — lose the formula maintenance.
Spreadsheets are great — until they aren't
A spreadsheet is the right first tool. It's free, it's flexible, and for one or two properties it does the job. The problem isn't Excel or Google Sheets — it's that a rental portfolio grows, and a single sheet doesn't grow with it.
Each new property adds tabs, formulas and places for a number to go wrong. The sheet that once gave you answers starts quietly hiding them. You're not doing it wrong — you've simply outgrown the tool.
The five warning signs
- › A formula broke and you didn't notice for months
- › You're not 100% sure every tenant actually paid
- › Receipts and invoices live in five different places
- › "final_v3_REAL.xlsx" — which version is the truth?
- › You can't say which property actually makes money
If you nodded at three or more, you've hit the tipping point.
A broken cell isn't free
Money that leaks
Missed rent, a mortgage rate you didn't react to, a property running at a loss you couldn't see — small gaps, real cash.
Time you don't have
The monthly copy-paste, the year-end scramble to make it all reconcile — hours that never make you a penny.
Decisions in the dark
Which door to refinance, sell or fix first? A tangle of tabs can't tell you. So the decision waits — and costs you.
Not a fancier spreadsheet — a portfolio brain
The point of switching isn't prettier cells. It's software that keeps itself up to date and answers the one question a sheet never could: which of my properties makes money, and which quietly loses it?
Every door on its own
Income and costs lined up property by property — not smeared across one giant sheet.
Feeds itself from Gmail
Connect Gmail read-only and rent statements and invoices flow into the right property automatically.
Net profit, after the mortgage
The Property Efficiency Score turns the mess into one figure per door — the number that actually matters.
Imports your file as-is
Drop in the Excel or Google Sheet you already keep — messy is fine. Your history comes with you.
No version chaos
One source of truth for the whole portfolio — no more "which file is the real one?"
Digital records by default
Your records stay digital and organised — the foundation Making Tax Digital is built on.
Spreadsheets alone won't pass MTD
From April 2026, Making Tax Digital for Income Tax means records must be digital and updates sent through compatible software — a standalone spreadsheet is no longer enough. Moving now makes the change a non-event.
Read the MTD for landlords guide →Spreadsheet questions, answered
What is the best spreadsheet alternative for landlords? +
The best alternative is purpose-built landlord software that keeps income and expenses per property, updates itself from your rent statements and invoices, and shows net profit per property after the mortgage — without you maintaining formulas. Monkey Riot does this and reads your existing spreadsheet as-is, so you keep your history without re-typing it.
How many properties before a spreadsheet stops working? +
There's no hard number, but most landlords feel the strain between about 4 and 25 properties. That's when broken formulas, missed rent, scattered receipts and version chaos start costing real money and time, because one sheet can no longer keep every door up to date.
Can I keep using my spreadsheet if I switch? +
You don't have to abandon it. Monkey Riot imports your existing Excel or Google Sheets file as-is — messy is fine — and lays your data out per property. You keep the history you've built up; you just stop maintaining the formulas by hand.
Is a spreadsheet still allowed under Making Tax Digital? +
Under Making Tax Digital for Income Tax, records must be kept digitally and quarterly updates sent through compatible software, so a standalone spreadsheet is no longer enough on its own. Keeping records in dedicated software now makes the 2026–2028 transition far easier. See our MTD for landlords guide and how to choose the best MTD software, and check GOV.UK for your position.
Do I have to re-enter all my data to switch? +
No. Monkey Riot is built to ingest the file you already have — drop in your spreadsheet and it populates your portfolio. From then on, connecting Gmail (read-only) lets new rent statements and invoices flow in automatically, so the manual re-keying stops.