New landlord? Your first gas-safety steps

If you let a property with gas appliances, you must have them and their flues checked for safety every 12 months by a Gas Safe registered engineer, give your tenant a copy of the record (before a new tenant moves in, or within 28 days for an existing one), and keep records for at least two years. It's a legal duty from your first tenancy.

Before your first tenant moves in

• Arrange a gas safety check by a Gas Safe registered engineer if there isn't a current one; the property must have a valid record before the tenant moves in.
• Give the new tenant a copy of that record before they get the keys. In England, failing to do so can also affect a later Section 21 notice.
• Make sure carbon monoxide alarms are fitted where required and working.

Then, every year

• Renew the gas safety check every 12 months. There's no grace period, so track the next-due date, not the date of the last check.
• Give existing tenants a copy of each new record within 28 days of the check.
• Keep every record for at least two years, somewhere you can find it.

The mistakes that catch new landlords

The common ones are simple: relying on the tenant to remember, letting the renewal date drift earlier each year, and storing records somewhere they can't be found when it matters. All three are solved by tracking the next-due date and keeping records in one place from the start, before you have more than one property to think about.

Gas safety is one part of a bigger first-year list, alongside deposit protection, an EICR for electrical safety, right-to-rent checks and the right insurance. But it's the one with an annual, no-grace-period deadline, so it's worth getting into a rhythm early.