There are hundreds of housing queues in Sweden for different rental associations and property owners offering serious rental services with first-hand contracts for rental properties. The advantage of these contracts is that it is like living in your own home, but the rent is paid directly to the owner. There are also other types of rental contracts in Sweden, but the opportunities for the tenant are usually very limited compared to a first-hand contract. Therefore, it is a good and safe choice to turn to housing queues that mediate first-hand contracts for rentals. A first-hand contract is also economically beneficial – rents are often lower than if you rent second-hand where excessive rents can occur. Renting an apartment is also a good solution if you cannot or do not want to spend large sums on a condominium.
How do you get in line for a housing queue?
Regardless of where or how you live, you can join a housing queue. Some believe that you cannot be in a housing queue if, for example, you already own a condominium or have a rental contract, but this is not true. For example, an owner of a condominium in Lund can join a housing queue for a first-hand contract in Stockholm.
There are housing queues for more types of housing options such as apartments, student housing, and senior housing. Housing queues exist all over Sweden, but some can be difficult to find and all queues have different systems. Once you have found the queues you want to join, registration is required through various websites. For example, in Stockholm County, there are about 30 different housing queues, and in Västra Götaland, there are about 25.
Does it seem complicated? If you choose to handle the registration yourself, it can be both difficult and time-consuming. It doesn't have to be that way. Dibz is a service developed to make it easy and convenient to join and accumulate points in the Swedish housing queues. On dibz.se, over 100 Swedish housing queues are collected in one place. To use the service, you need to be at least 16 years old. All you need to do is register and then choose which areas are of interest, then dibz takes care of the registration for all the queues you want to join. Most housing queues are free to join, while others cost money, for example, it costs 200 SEK per year to join the Housing Agency.
Some housing queues require you to log in, for example, every three or six months to keep your place in the queue. You don't need to worry about this when joining the queues via dibz – everything is handled automatically so there is no risk of losing a queue spot. With dibz, all housing queues are collected in one place, and you accumulate queue points without lifting a finger.
How do you get a first-hand contract?
Being in a housing queue is a good way to plan for the future, as some queues in popular areas can be long – some up to several years. In other housing queues, it is much faster to get an offer of a first-hand contract. Generally, it takes longer in metropolitan regions, while smaller municipalities often have much shorter waiting times. A tip to increase the chances of a first-hand contract is to join several queues and not limit yourself to just one city or municipality. You should also not wait too long to join a housing queue, as you start accumulating queue days immediately after registration.
When you finally receive an offer, it is important to be active in responding yes or no before the response time is up, otherwise, you can lose your queue spot and the offer goes to the next person in the queue. Good luck with your housing queue!
