Your home booked through the quiet months, by guests who stay a month or more.
We find contractors, NHS and agency staff, people relocating and families between homes, put every stay on the right written agreement, and run it from keys to final clean. Fewer changeovers, steadier months, and no lock-in.
Straight Up Stays runs UK homes for stays of a month or more: contractors and crews, NHS and agency staff, people relocating, families between homes and corporate guests. We market the home directly and through contractor and relocation partners, price each stay as one monthly figure with the bills in, put it on our own licence agreement for serviced accommodation, take payment in advance, and run housekeeping, repairs and the final changeover. Long stays fill the quiet months while short stays keep the season. The fee is a percentage of booking revenue, with no lock-in and 30 days’ notice.
Updated 29 October 2026. Rules from GOV.UK and legislation.gov.uk, sources below.
A mid-term result
£67,500
A three-bedroom bungalow that had earned around £1,100 a month as a long let took a single booking of 546 nights at an average of £171.82 a night, paying out £67,500. That is one property, not a typical or guaranteed result. See The Bungalow.
“We had a very pleasant stay at Leo’s place, which was very handy for the rail station and the city centre. I’d be happy to stay there again.”
“a very friendly and accommodating host (he really saved us) for a comfortable and very well-equipped residence. when the development work in the neighbourhood is finished it will be even more easily accessible!”
If a long stay could fill your quiet months, see what your home could earn.
Get my free revenue estimateWhy homes miss it
Most owners list by the night on one or two sites and hope a long stay finds them.
Long stays rarely book that way. An employer, an agency or an insurer sends them, and they want an invoice, one price with the bills in, and an answer the same day.
And a month-long stay taken casually can drift into a tenancy. Since 1 May 2026 there is no section 21 to end one.
So we go to where long stays come from, price each one as a monthly figure, put it on our own licence agreement, and run it from keys to final clean.
The length-of-stay dial
Slide from one night to six months. Past 28 nights the job changes, from turning the home round to getting the agreement right, and that is the part we run for you.
Stays of 1 night
365changeovers a year, if every stay ran this long
Stays of 3 nights
122changeovers a year, if every stay ran this long
Stays of 1 week
52changeovers a year, if every stay ran this long
Stays of 2 weeks
26changeovers a year, if every stay ran this long
Stays of 28 nights
13changeovers a year, if every stay ran this long
Stays of 1 month
12changeovers a year, if every stay ran this long
Stays of 3 months
4changeovers a year, if every stay ran this long
Stays of 6 months
2changeovers a year, if every stay ran this long
| Stay | Changeovers a year | Who books | Paperwork | Counts toward 70 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 night | 365 | Weekend breaks, event guests and people passing through. | The booking site’s terms and your house rules. | Yes |
| 3 nights | 122 | City and coast breaks, couples and small families. | The booking site’s terms and your house rules. | Yes |
| 1 week | 52 | Holiday weeks, families in the school holidays, a week’s work nearby. | Booking terms, and a company invoice if an employer pays. | Yes |
| 2 weeks | 26 | Contractors on a short job, staff covering a rota, a fortnight between houses. | Booking terms, the guest’s ID, and a company invoice where an employer pays. | Yes |
| 28 nights | 13 | Agency nurses on a four-week block, outage and shutdown crews. | A written agreement for the stay, with the employer as the customer where they pay. | Yes |
| 1 month | 12 | Staff relocating for a new job, people between houses, consultants on a contract. | Our licence agreement for serviced accommodation: a fixed end date, who is paying, and where the guest’s main home is. | No |
| 3 months | 4 | Project crews, families housed while their own home is repaired, longer contracts. | The licence, plus your lender’s, lease’s and insurer’s terms checked before we accept. | No |
| 6 months | 2 | Long projects and relocations, booked by the employer. | The licence, with a fixed end date and no rollover. A longer stay is a new agreement. | No |
“Great place perfect for a long stay or a long weekend”
Who books
Long-stay guests are booked by a reason, usually work, and often paid for by somebody else. The listing, the price and the reply are written for that reason.
A whole home near the job, room for the vans, and one invoice to the company. Our crew stays near Sellafield show how we sell a house to a crew.
Placements and rota blocks run for weeks at a time. A home near a hospital is marketed to the staff and the agencies that place them, priced as one monthly figure with the bills in.
A furnished home while they start the job and look for a house, often paid for by the employer. We reach them directly and through relocation partners.
A sale that slips or a renovation that overruns. Two or three bedrooms and a proper kitchen keep everyday life going until the keys come through.
While their own home is repaired, a family is usually housed nearby for months. A whole home with parking and a washing machine suits them far better than hotel rooms.
Project work and secondments book by the month through the employer, who wants a fixed price, an invoice and somebody who answers the phone.
Direct bookings are our other speciality: how a holiday let takes bookings direct.
The paperwork
It can, which is why the agreement matters more than the price. The risk, in three lines:
A work stay isn’t a holiday. The Housing Act 1988 keeps a letting whose purpose is a holiday outside an assured tenancy. A contractor or a nurse on a placement isn’t on holiday.
So the other tests decide it. Where an individual lives in the home as their only or main home, the arrangement can be an assured tenancy.
And section 21 has gone. Since 1 May 2026, ending an assured tenancy needs a ground for possession and, if the occupier doesn’t leave, a court order.
The law in full, including company lets and the principal-home test, is in our guide: are mid-term lets worth it?
What we do about it
Every stay of 28 nights or more goes on our own licence agreement for serviced accommodation, written to keep it a licence to occupy.
Whether an arrangement is a licence or a tenancy turns on what actually happens during the stay, whatever the agreement is called. This is how we run stays; for advice on your own home, ask a solicitor.
A mixed year keeps both.
Short stays from April to October have 214 nights to find the 70 that count, a third of them. Long stays fill the winter, when short stays are thinnest, and don’t need to count. An illustration, not a forecast: your estimate shows real figures for your home.
| Rule | What it says | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Business rates, England | A self-catering home is assessed for business rates if it was available for 140 nights and let for 70 in 12 months. Nights in a stay of more than 28 nights don’t count toward the 70. | GOV.UK, self-catering property, updated 29 September 2026 |
| The holiday exclusion | A tenancy whose purpose is to let the tenant occupy for a holiday can’t be an assured tenancy. | Housing Act 1988, Schedule 1, paragraph 9 |
| An assured tenancy | A home let as a separate dwelling to an individual who occupies it as their only or principal home. | Housing Act 1988, section 1 |
| Section 21 | Landlords can’t use section 21 to seek possession; they need a ground for possession, then a court order if the tenant stays. | GOV.UK, repossessing after 1 May 2026, updated 13 July 2026 |
| Second homes, council tax | Councils in England may add up to 100% to the council tax on a furnished home that no one lives in as their main home. | Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023, section 80, from 1 April 2025 |
Wales and Scotland set their own tests. What your property counts as explains the 140/70 test in full, and the insurance guide covers what a policy needs to say about long stays.
What’s included
The marketing, pricing, agreements and guest care are run centrally. The physical work is done by professionals near your home, trialled before the first guest, and we stay answerable for both. Your part is approving the plan and reading one statement a month.
Mid-term stays sit inside our full Airbnb and short-let management, so a home can take both. Thinking of a 12-month let instead? Short let or long let, compared.
Before you decide
Your free revenue estimate shows what the home could earn month by month, built from paid market data on comparable homes near you. Leo talks it through on the phone, including which quiet months a long stay should fill.
Before the first long stay
We check the home has what a month needs: a desk that works for a laptop, fast wifi, a washing machine, a kitchen that cooks a real meal, and clear notes on parking and bins. Bills are folded into one price.
From launch
Your home’s own booking page, long-stay listings on the booking sites, contractor and relocation partners, and employers near you, all run from one calendar so a night is never sold twice.
Before the keys
Who is paying and why they’re staying, the guest’s ID, the employer’s details where they pay, the licence signed, and payment taken in advance before anyone arrives.
During the stay
Weekly housekeeping and linen by a vetted local professional cleaning company, repairs through local trades within the limit you set, a check on the home at each visit, one changeover at the end, and one statement a month.
Your options
Each suits somebody. This is how they compare on the things that decide what the quiet months earn and how easily you get your home back.
| Option | Who finds the guest | The quiet months | Changeovers | The paperwork | Getting your home back |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nightly stays only | The booking sites | Often empty, or priced down to fill | After every stay | Booking terms | Any night you block |
| A 12-month let | You or a letting agent | Covered by the rent, with no seasonal upside | Once a year or less | An assured periodic tenancy, with no section 21 since 1 May 2026 | Only with a ground for possession |
| Mid-term stays on your own | Whoever happens to find your listing | Filled if the right guest finds you | Few | Whatever agreement you write | Depends on that agreement |
| Full management with mid-term stays | We market to crews, staff and relocating families, directly and through partners | Filled with one long booking where it beats the nights | Weekly housekeeping, one changeover per stay | Our licence for serviced accommodation, with a fixed end date | Your dates agreed up front and kept clear |
Questions
Rather ask Leo?
Leo Simpson has specialised in UK holiday lets since 2020 and sets the plan for every home we run. 01271 447054
It is full management for a home let in stays of about a month or more, usually to contractors and crews, NHS and agency staff, people relocating, families between homes and corporate guests. Straight Up Stays finds the guest, prices the stay as one monthly figure with the bills in, puts it on a written licence agreement, vets the guest and takes payment in advance, then runs housekeeping, repairs and the final changeover. It can run all year, or through the quiet months alongside short stays.
There is no legal definition. In practice it means stays from about a month to six months. The line that matters most in England is 28 nights: a stay longer than that does not count toward the 70 let nights a holiday let needs to be assessed for business rates, so long stays are planned around it.
Mostly people whose work or circumstances keep them somewhere for a while: contractors and work crews, NHS and agency staff on placements, people relocating for a new job, families between homes, families housed while their own home is repaired after a flood or fire, and consultants on a contract. Many are booked and paid for by an employer or an agency.
That depends on the home and the months. A mid-term stay is priced as a furnished, all-in monthly figure, so you carry the bills and housekeeping a tenant would normally pay. In return you get your home back on a fixed date, and the quiet months fill while the season stays open for short stays. Your free revenue estimate shows what the home could earn month by month, and Leo talks you through where a long stay fits.
It can, which is why the paperwork matters. The Housing Act 1988 keeps a letting whose purpose is a holiday outside an assured tenancy, and a work stay is not a holiday. Where an individual lives in the home as their only or main home, the arrangement can become an assured tenancy, and since 1 May 2026 there is no section 21 to end one. We put every stay of 28 nights or more on our own licence agreement for serviced accommodation, with the employer as the customer where an employer pays, a fixed end date, the guest’s main home elsewhere confirmed in writing, and housekeeping access kept. Whether any arrangement is a licence or a tenancy turns on the facts of the stay. This is how we run stays; for advice on your own home, ask a solicitor.
In England, no. GOV.UK’s guidance for self-catering property says nights in a stay of more than 28 nights do not count toward the 70 nights a property must be let in 12 months. A home that wants to stay on business rates needs those 70 nights from shorter stays. April to October is 214 nights; letting 70 of them is a third.
Bills are included in the monthly price we set, so they are yours as the owner and the price is set with them in. If the home is assessed for business rates there is no council tax. If it is on council tax, the bill usually stays with you while the guest’s main home is elsewhere, and a second-homes premium can apply. It is set out in writing before a stay starts.
Yes, and for most homes that is the strongest year: short stays through the season and on the weekends that pay best, long stays in the months short stays cannot fill. Your own dates are agreed up front and kept clear of both.
We check who is paying and why they are staying: the employer’s or agency’s details where a company pays, the guest’s ID, and where their main home is. The licence is signed and the first payment taken before anyone gets the keys.
Check before the first one. Consent to let and holiday-let insurance are usually written for short stays, and one guest for three months is a different risk. We ask for your mortgage, lease and policy terms at the start, and a long stay they do not allow is a stay we do not take.
The same as our full management: a percentage of booking revenue, confirmed in your proposal before you sign anything. There is no lock-in, no exit fee and 30 days’ notice.
Yes. Marketing, pricing, agreements and guest care are run centrally, and the physical work goes to a vetted local professional cleaning company and local trades, trialled before the first guest. There is no local office: you speak to Leo, who sets your home’s plan.
Tell us about the property. You’ll get a realistic revenue range built from paid market data on comparable homes near you, with the assumptions shown, and Leo rings to talk through where long stays fit your year.
