Tenant-owned apartment, rental apartment or ownership?

Types of accommodation

Source: Boverket: Forms of tenure and housing, Jordabalken, 1, 12 and 20 chap. (riksdagen.se), Tenant-owned apartment law (1991:614), 2, 3, 6 and 9 chap. (riksdagen.se), Private rental law (2026:772) (riksdagen.se), Law (2002:93) on cooperative rental apartment (riksdagen.se).

What is the difference between tenant-owned apartment and rental apartment?

With a rental apartment, you rent the home from a landlord, which can be a municipal housing company, a private property company, a tenant-owned apartment association or a private person. You terminate the agreement with three months' notice to the end of the month.

A tenant-owned apartment is, according to Boverket, a right of use to the apartment without time limit, together with membership and an economic share in the association. You do not own the apartment as real property. When you move, you sell the tenant-owned apartment, and the buyer must become a member. The board reviews this according to bostadsrättslagen (the Swedish Housing Cooperatives Act) and the statutes. How you review the association before a purchase is stated in the guide to the tenant-owned apartment association.

Source: Boverket: Forms of tenure and housing.

Tenant-owned apartment or bostadsrätt?

An owner-occupied apartment is a three-dimensional property that only contains one residential apartment. You own the apartment itself and apply for a title deed when you buy. According to Boverket, you can sell, give away, mortgage and rent out the apartment without the tenant-owned apartment association's permission. The common areas, such as the roof, facade, stairwell and pipes, are normally managed through a joint facility, where the owners are shareholders in an association. Owner-occupied apartments may be formed since 1 May 2009, in new production and when spaces that were not previously residential are converted.

Source: Boverket: Forms of tenure and housing, Jordabalken, 1, 12 and 20 chap. (riksdagen.se).

What is cooperative rental apartment?

A co-operative rental apartment association owns or rents the house and rents out the apartments to its members. When you move in, you usually pay a membership fee, which is normally paid back when you move out, minus any unpaid fees or damages you are responsible for. The apartment cannot be sold as a tenant-owned apartment; it is returned to the association.

Source: Boverket: Forms of tenure and housing, Law (2002:93) on cooperative rental apartment (riksdagen.se).

Communal houses and shared accommodation

A communal house is a house where each household has its own apartment and also shares a larger kitchen and other common areas. Each communal house association decides itself what is included, and often the residents are expected to participate in cooking and maintenance of the house. Boverket distinguishes it from a residential collective, where each person has their own room and shares kitchen, living room and sometimes bathroom with the others.

If you share a rental apartment, you can both be on the contract. If one of you cancels, the one who stays has the right to have the contract extended for themselves, if the landlord can reasonably accept it. The other way is that one has the first-hand contract and the others are lodgers. Then the first-hand tenant is the landlord to them and is responsible for the apartment, and the one who rents out must live there themselves, otherwise it is subletting that requires permission. More about that in the guide on lodger.

Friends who share a household and are registered at the address can have a joint home insurance, but a lodger needs their own. If you buy a tenant-owned apartment together without being married or cohabiting, the association can refuse the one who buys a share membership, unless the statutes say otherwise.

Source: Boverket: Neighbouring concepts to village communities, Hyresgästföreningen (the Swedish Union of Tenants): Renting out to lodgers, Consumers: Home insurance, how do you live?, Jordabalken, 1, 12 and 20 chap. (riksdagen.se), Tenant-owned apartment law (1991:614), 2, 3, 6 and 9 chap. (riksdagen.se).

Terrace house or row house: what is the difference?

Both are small houses that are connected to the neighboring houses. A row house is connected to the houses next to it in a row, while a terrace house is connected to the neighbor via, for example, a garage or storage room. For the move, the form of tenure plays a greater role than the type of house: row houses and terrace houses are available with both full ownership and as tenant-owned apartments, and that determines whether you apply for lagfart or become a member of an association.

Source: Boverket: Forms of tenure and housing.

What happens to the apartment when you leave it?

It determines how you terminate the accommodation and what you do when you arrive at the new one. If you are leaving a rental apartment, you terminate it, see the guide on termination notice for rental apartment. If you are selling a tenant-owned apartment, you draw up a transfer agreement and the buyer applies for membership. If you are buying a house or a tenant-owned apartment, you apply for lagfart within three months and often a mortgage deed for the loan, see lagfart and mortgage deed. If you are going to rent out instead of selling, different rules apply: rental apartments and tenant-owned apartments require consent, while the Private Rental Law applies when you rent out a villa or a tenant-owned apartment as a private person.

The law behind it

The sections summarised, with a link to the legal text on riksdagen.se.