What is an SA302, and why do mortgage lenders ask for one?

An SA302 is HMRC’s record of your Self Assessment tax calculation for a given year, showing your declared income and the tax due on it. If you are self-employed, a company director, or otherwise complete a tax return, a lender assessing a mortgage or remortgage will often ask to see one as evidence of your income, since your income is not confirmed by a payslip in the way an employee’s is.

What does an SA302 actually show?

An SA302 sets out the income you declared on your Self Assessment return, broken down by source, for example self-employment profit, dividends, rental income or employment income, along with the tax calculated as due. Lenders use it to see your total income for the year, rather than relying only on a summary figure you provide yourself.

How do you get an SA302?

Most people file Self Assessment returns online now, which changes how you get the document:

• HMRC online account. If you filed your own return, you can usually print your tax calculation from your HMRC online account around 72 hours after you submitted it, by going to the Self Assessment section and looking for details about your returns and payments.
• Accountant or commercial software. If an accountant filed your return using commercial software, you can ask them to print an equivalent document from that software. It is sometimes labelled a tax computation rather than an SA302, but most lenders treat it the same way.
• By post from HMRC. HMRC no longer routinely issues a paper SA302 to everyone who asks, so most applicants rely on one of the two routes above. Check the current position on gov.uk if you need to confirm this for your situation.

You can typically access up to 4 years of tax calculations this way, which is useful if a lender wants to compare more than one year.

SA302 vs tax year overview

Lenders commonly ask for both because a self-printed tax calculation does not carry HMRC’s own letterhead, so the tax year overview acts as independent confirmation that the figures match what HMRC has on record. Our guide on what a tax year overview is covers this document in more detail.

How many years will a lender want?

This varies. Lenders commonly ask for 2 years of accounts or SA302s, though some consider 1 year, particularly where other parts of the application are strong. Some lenders average the two years’ income, and others use the lower or most recent figure, especially if income has fallen. Contractors are sometimes assessed differently, often on day rate rather than declared profit, and company directors may have both salary and dividends looked at, with some lenders also considering retained profit in the business, covered further in our page on remortgaging as a company director. Our page on self-employed remortgaging explains how different types of self-employed income are generally treated.

What if you only have one year of accounts?

Some lenders will consider a single year, particularly for a well-established trade or profession, or where a strong deposit or low loan-to-value offsets the shorter trading history. Our page on remortgaging with one year of accounts looks at this specifically, including what else can help an application with limited trading history.

What if you are a company director?

Company directors are often assessed a little differently from sole traders. Some lenders look mainly at salary and dividends shown on your SA302, while others also consider profit retained in the business rather than drawn out as income, which can help if you deliberately leave money in the company. Ask any lender or broker which approach they use, since this can noticeably change how much income they think you can evidence, and it is not something we can generalise into a single rule here.

Checking your SA302 before you send it

Before sending your SA302 and tax year overview to a lender or broker, check the tax years match what has been requested, the figures are legible if scanned or photographed, and your name and Unique Taxpayer Reference are correct. If you have more than one source of income, such as self-employment alongside rental income, check the SA302 breaks these down clearly, since a lender may want to see how much of your total income comes from each source. If anything looks wrong, correcting it with HMRC before applying is quicker than explaining a discrepancy partway through underwriting.

What if you can’t get one quickly enough?

If you need an SA302 urgently, for example because a deal is close to ending, check your HMRC online account first, since this is usually the fastest route. If you use an accountant, ask them how quickly they can access and print the equivalent document from their software. Leaving this until the last few days before a deadline is one of the more avoidable causes of delay in a self-employed application.

What this means if you are remortgaging with adverse credit

Self-employed applicants who also have a CCJ, default or other adverse credit are often assessed on two fronts at once: the lender’s view of the income evidence, including SA302s and tax year overviews, and the lender’s view of the credit history. A specialist lender used to self-employed applications may look at both together more flexibly than a mainstream lender, but the paperwork requirements do not usually change, so getting your SA302s and tax year overviews ready in advance still matters. If HMRC debt or a payment plan with HMRC is part of your situation, our page on self-employed remortgaging with HMRC debt covers that specific case. Gathering the last 2 years of SA302s and tax year overviews, alongside your business bank statements and current mortgage statement, before you approach a lender or broker tends to make the conversation quicker and avoids a second request for the same information partway through your application.