Can I write off allowable expenses over multiple years?

Hello,

I can't seem to find the answer to this question anywhere so was hoping someone could help. We have had considerable work done on our property over the last 5 years which would all constitute expenses rather than capital expenditure. We intend to leave our house and rent it out this year so I was wondering if we could write past expenses off against future rental income. We have incurred approximately GBP 10,000 in expenses over the 5 years so I was hoping we could write it off over say the next 3 years (ie. 3333 per year). Is this possible?

I found a reference to something called Pre-letting Expenses whereby you can use the last 7 years of expenses, but i wasn't 100% clear if this was for a buy to let property and also it wasn't clear to me whether the past expenses had to all be used in the first year of letting or you could write it off over multiple years. Any ideas? If you have to use it all up in the first year of letting then should I wait until the start of the next tax year before we start letting so that I get a full years worth of rent to write it off against (ie. I wouldn't generate enough rent to cover the expenses before the end of the tax year in a couple of months time).

Thanks in advance for your help.