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Reinfeldt slams Stockholm rental ‘market’

Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt has criticised the system for how rental apartments are apportioned in Stockholm, advocating that rental apartments in the Swedish capital be converted to tenant-owner apartments.

Published: 14 February 2011 11:26 CET

“Everyone who’s been near Stockholm’s inner city knows that the concept of secure-tenure rental apartments (hyresrätter) just doesn’t work there,” Reinfeldt told the Dagens Nyheter (DN) newspaper.

“You’re supposed to hand over your secure-tenure contract to the next tenant, but in reality a black market has developed,” he said.

He pointed out that many rental contracts end up being used in apartment swaps.

The comments come following several articles published in DN recently highlighting the growing social divisions in Stockholm that come as a result of the city’s difficult housing market.

According to DN, people with higher incomes occupy an increasingly large percentage of downtown Stockholm’s housing stock.

In the last two decades, the income difference between residents living in central Stockholm and those in the surrounding areas has jumped from 5 percent to 29 percent.

Stockholm’s system of apportioning rental apartments through secure-tenure rental contracts was developed as a way to guarantee all residents the ability to find housing.

However, as demand to live in Stockholm’s city centre has increased, the system currently doesn’t function as originally intended, resulting in artificially low rents for inner-city flats and providing incentive for tenants who hold contracts not to relinquish them.

“What Reinfeldt is saying is that secure-tenure rental apartments aren’t a part of the regular rental market, which had led to secure-tenure rental being dead in principle in the inner-city. But newly produced rental apartments with market-based rents exist. And there is a market for them,” said Hans Lind, a real estate professor with the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), to the TT news agency.

“If a rental market means having floating rents, then market-based rents are a pre-condition. If you look elsewhere in the world, there is a market for sublets in the downtown areas of major cities,” he added.

In other cities, apartments that aren’t used by the owner are often rented out to one or several tenants, often young people or students.

“So in other large cities in the world there is actually room for two rental markets in the inner-city,” said Lind.

The problem in Sweden, according to Lind, is that owners of tenant-owner apartments (bostadsrätter) can’t sublet their properties at market-based rents, while in other cities there is a market for expensive, luxury rental apartments as well as one for more modest sublets.

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PROPERTY

INTERVIEW: ‘Most foreigners in Sweden don’t know they can get back excess rent’

In Sweden, people subletting apartments are not allowed to charge more in rent than they themselves pay. But foreign subtenants don't always know this. We asked Roland Sjölin, lawyer at the Swedish Tenants' Association, about how to get back excess rent.

Published: 18 April 2024 15:19 CEST
INTERVIEW: 'Most foreigners in Sweden don't know they can get back excess rent'

More and more of the people asking the Swedish Tenants’ Association, Hyresgästföreningen in Swedish, for help with excess rent are foreigners, Sjölin told The Local in an interview.

“The problem is that if you’re coming from another country, and you’re subletting an apartment, you’re probably not familiar with the rules in Sweden, because in other countries, it might be okay to overcharge your tenants.” 

He said that clients from India in particular seeking help from the association were now “very common”. 

“Many people come here to work as engineers in the IT sector and then have to rent somewhere,” he said, adding that as a group Indians appeared to be “very aware of their rights.”

Sweden’s rental sector is heavily regulated, with first hand contracts negotiated between landlords and the Tenants’ Association, and the rent that can be charged for second-hand contracts limited to only a small fraction above what the first-hand renter pays. 

“You’re not allowed to make any profit subletting an apartment in Sweden,” Sjölin explains. “You can only charge the subletting tenant the same rent as you [the first-hand tenant] are paying to your landlord, and then you can add the costs for internet and electricity, and perhaps a parking lot, if that is included.” 

Tenants’ Association lawyer Roland Sjölin. Photo: supplied.

You can also add a påslag or “markup”, if you are renting out the apartment fully furnished, but this cannot exceed more than 15 percent of the rent. 

That doesn’t mean that most landlords follow the law. The competition for rental apartments, especially in Stockholm, is so intense, that unscrupulous sublet landlords often try to get away with charging well over the legal amount, charging what is known in Sweden as ockerhyra, or “excess rent” and hoping that their tenants are too desperate to complain.  

What many foreigners do not realise is that even after the rental period is over, they can still get back any excess rent they have paid by applying to the Rental Board or Hyresnämnden, which functions like a court judging rental disputes. 

“If you have the evidence then it’s fairly easy,” Sjölin said. “I get a new case every second week on repayment of unfair rent, and I think that I win most of them.” 

“Nowadays, you can get paid back excess rent up to 24 months back in time, so people tend to get more money,” he added. “In some cases, they can get 200,000 kronor. In other cases, perhaps it’s only 30,000 kronor or 60,000 kronor. It depends on how long you have rented the apartment, and how excessive the rent you’ve been paying has been.”

The first step is to establish what would have been a fair rent, either by asking your landlord what they themselves pay directly or by checking with the Tenants’ Association.

“Because we negotiate most rents in Sweden, we normally know what the firsthand rent is,” Sjölin explained.

Then you need to collect together your evidence.

“It’s a good thing to have a written contract and also papers from your bank showing that you paid rent every month, and perhaps photographs of the apartment, so the rental board can get an idea of the apartment you were renting and what would be a fair rent, and also the termination for the contract so you can show the court how long you’ve been living in the apartment.” 

But Sjölin underlined that since Sweden has free burden of evidence, none of this is essential. 

“Even if you’ve been paying in cash, if you have witnesses who can testify what you were paying each month, you still have a chance of getting your money back. It’s a bit more tricky, but I’ve won two cases like that this year.” 

People in Sweden, he explained, tend to wait until the rental period is over before seeking to get paid back excess rent rather than challenging their landlord while they are still living in the apartment. 

“You don’t have any legal protection for your home for the first two years, so if you bring the matter up with the person you’re renting the apartment from you risk losing your contract and having to move out, so most people wait until they’re supposed to move anyway,” he said.

If you apply to the rental board for a refund close to the day you move out, you can then make your landlord pay back all excess rent paid in the 24 months leading up to the date you contacted the rental board.

If you are a member of the Tenants’ Association, you can contact them and ask for help with your application, but there are also specialist companies, like Orimlig Hyra AB who will buy your case off you and give you a refund within 48 hours, saving you a long wait in exchange for a cut of the money reclaimed. 

Sjölin said that the rental board normally took about 8 months to come to a judgement, but that if the person with the first hand contract appeals, that could extend the waiting time by between six months and a year.

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