(edit title) Advice on apartment-hunting trip Is a 4 or 5 day trip worthwhile? Options

[MsFizz]

My family is moving to Stockholm sometime in July so my husband can start a job in August. We need to find our own accommodation, and we know this will be very difficult. (We had some great advice on that point from an earlier thread here.)

Possibly I would be able to go to Stockholm for a 4-5 day trip in late May or early June to have a first go at apartment-hunting, with the help of bostaddirekt. blocket etc. I know no one can tell me whether I will find an apartment in that time. What I am wondering though, is if I do find a suitable apartment that someone wants to sublet to me, will I have enough time to sort out the ensuing formalities? At the moment I'm under the impression that the main thing that needs to happen after you find an apartment is that the building association has to approve you as a subletting tenant. Is that something I could likely finalise from abroad as long as things were started when I was in Stockholm?

Also, I notice that there are lots of ads at the moment for short-term summer sublets. While we would like to get something medium-long term, we'd be open to taking a place for a couple of months to start with to have a better chance to search. Would these 6-12 week summer contracts typically also go through the building associations, or do they tend to be under the table? (I would very much like to do everything on the up and up!)

I'm thinking that even if the apartment-hunting wasn't successful the trip could still be a useful chance to take a look at different areas of Stockholm to help in future searching. Does anyone have suggestions of other things it would be useful to do on a short reccie trip?

Thanks in advance for any advice you can offer!

[Darwinder]

Hey! I can't answer 100% for Stockholm as I live in Gothenburg but the market here is also a difficult one to crack, but not to the same degree as Stockholm I am sure.

Anyways, as I am sure you know there are 2 different types of contracts in the Swedish rental market, there are 1st hand and 2nd hand. 1st hand means you are basically leasing and can live there for as long as you want, 2nd hand means you are renting off a person that has a 1st hand lease and you are renting there lease, the typical length is 6 months to a year with the max being 1 year. The waiting list on most apartments in Gothenburg is 5 years + for a 1st hand right now, and in the prime areas of town there are thousands of people queing on the bostad 1st hand sites so when you get here your going to want to target 2nd hand primarily. The best site for 2nd hand apartments is blocket.se .

Saying that, use english to your advantage, reply to any ad you like on blocket.se in english and give them some background info, like where you are from, what your husband does for a living, if you like golfing, anything to give you and advantage over other people that reply with one liners like "is this place still available". You want to sell yourself in 2 paragraphs and list a bunch of stuff that maybe the other person might have in common, especially peculiar stuff that you may be into like if you play the fiddle or are a chess champion or something, Swedes love to help out others that are in the same niches as them, seriously trust me on this. We were lucky when we moved to Gothenburg we found a place within 4 days of getting here just by me talking about how I am looking forward to fishing here, and then bam a guy got back to me, huge into flyfishing and gave us his apartment over 500+ applicants.

Once you are all moved in and settled into your 2nd hand rental, start looking for a 1st hand ASAP. Those 6months to a year pass real quick...it took us 11 months to get into a 1st hand and we started looking right away. Take any 1st hand apartment that comes your way, dont be picky. Once you move into your 1st hand apartment then right away put up an ad on lagenhetsbyte.se, its a site where people can trade 1st hand leases, all you need to do in convince someone living in an apartment you want to take your apartment =). So then finally you have done it, convinced someone, you can relax in an apartment that you actually like. The whole process can take awhile, better just to buy

So, it is possible, but you need a plan. Start emailing people now, and set up some meetings if you can. Best of luck to you!

[MsFizz]

Thanks for your very encouraging and positive reply! I think those are great tips about using English and personal interests to connect with someone who will want to rent us their flat.

[PDX]

For a few weeks summer rental, try www.airbnb.com . I have used the service and it works fine, you can find really nice apartments in premium areas to stay over during the summer.

There are also plenty of apartment hotels in the city which offer fully furnished apartments with kitchen etc.

~~~PDX~~~

[EricK]

Finalizing contract (legal documentation etc.) can be done in less than an hour. I guess you don't need to worry about what or how you make the contract. The real worry is to find someone who wants to let it to you.

I've got first hand contract in less than two months. Bostaddireket or blocket couldn't help me. You need to register on official queue bostad.stockholm.se

There are sometimes apartment which require no queue (Usually new buildings.) These apartments are marked with N and P symbol. You need to look for these symbol and apply on those.

I just saw and could see there are some apartments available right now with N and P symbols. Just create an account and get yourself in the queue.

[MsFizz]

EricK -- You say the contract can be finalised in less than an hour ... but I thought that if you have a second hand contract you need to get approved by the building association (bostadsrättsförening)? Surely this takes more than an hour?

Good tip about the possibility of first-hand rentals in new builds. I believe we can't join the queue until we get registered at Skatteverket, which we won't do until just before my husband starts his job. But it's certainly something to consider for our second place to live in Stockholm.

Thanks PDX -- I was looking at airbnb for possible accommodation during my trip, but I should look out for possibly temporary accomodation too. The apartment hotels I've looked at seem quite expensive, but it's definitely an option.

[chazza]

EricK -- You say the contract can be finalised in less than an hour ... but I thought that if you have a second hand contract you need to get approved by the building associat ... (show full quote)

EricK -- You say the contract can be finalised in less than an hour ... but I thought that if you have a second hand contract you need to get approved by the building association (bostadsrättsförening)? Surely this takes more than an hour? ... (hide full quote)

Yes it can absolutely take more than an hour because the application has to go before the board and it depends how often they meet. You may be lucky with your timing or you may have just missed a scheduled meeting and have to wait weeks till the next one.

[uduck]

Is there any website that I can sign up in order to start collecting queue days?

[MsFizz]

uduck -- EricK gave the website: bostad.stockholm.se. The exact link to start joining the queue is https://bokabostad.stockholm.se/Registrering.aspx

[MsFizz]

Yes it can absolutely take more than an hour because the application has to go before the board and it depends how often they meet. You may be lucky with your timing or you ma ... (show full quote)

Yes it can absolutely take more than an hour because the application has to go before the board and it depends how often they meet. You may be lucky with your timing or you may have just missed a scheduled meeting and have to wait weeks till the next one. ... (hide full quote)

Thanks chazza. Once the application goes before the board, supposing all goes well and there is then a contract to sign, would this be something that would require all parties to be in the same place at the same time? Or could this be handled by post/DHL from abroad (supposing the renter/board was willing to go to the trouble?)

[chazza]

No. the application for permission to rent is between the board and the apartment owner. You don't sign anything with the board, only the apartment owner.