Get all the data you need about the real estate market in Stockholm
SUMMARY
Is rent getting more expensive in Stockholm? Yes. First-hand rents are still rising in 2026, but the broad surge of the past few years is cooling and parts of the second-hand market outside the centre are already getting cheaper.
The most important split is no longer simply “Stockholm rents are rising.” Negotiated rents across Stockholm County are up about 3.5% in 2026, while Qasa found second-hand rents rising 3.5% in the inner city and falling 2.5% outside the inner-city tolls.
That means geography now matters almost as much as tenure. Central Stockholm still has pricing power, but renters who are flexible about location are starting to see more resistance from landlords farther out.
The recent slowdown should not be confused with cheap rent. Typical increases at the major municipal landlords since 2023 compound to roughly 19%, so today’s smaller annual rise is being added to a much higher base.
Stockholm’s biggest rent divide is still between people who already have first-hand contracts and people who need housing immediately. A two-room second-hand apartment can cost around SEK 14,500 a month versus roughly SEK 8,149 in the ordinary rental benchmark used by Qasa.
The queue explains why that premium survives. Existing rentals allocated through Bostadsförmedlingen required an average 9.6 years of queue time in 2025, which makes the cheaper first-hand option unavailable to many newcomers when they actually need a home.
New construction helps with access, but not necessarily affordability. New-build rentals require shorter queue times than existing stock, yet their rents are much higher, so extra supply does not automatically relieve the part of the market under the most pressure.
Stockholm also looks more expensive than Gothenburg and Malmö once renters are pushed into the second-hand market. The ordinary-rent gap between the three cities is fairly modest; the private-market gap is much larger.
Falling inflation does not mean Stockholm rents should immediately fall. Negotiated rents respond with a lag to financing, maintenance, wages and other landlord costs, which is why rent increases can stay above headline inflation for a while.
The practical outlook is uneven rather than dramatic. First-hand tenants are more likely to keep seeing modest annual increases, central second-hand renters remain exposed to high prices, and renters willing to move farther out finally have some evidence that asking rents can move down as well as up.
How to deal with a Stockholm broker without getting played
Bidding runs by message after the viewing, and the broker must keep a list of every bid that you are entitled to see afterwards. Who works for whom, and what to ask for in writing.
Is rent actually getting more expensive in Stockholm right now?
Yes. Stockholm rents are still getting more expensive today, although the rise has slowed and some second-hand rents outside the centre are already falling.
The clearest broad measure comes from Statistics Sweden. Across Greater Stockholm, rents in the ordinary rental stock rose 4.7% between 2024 and 2025. For 2026, Hyresgästföreningen’s completed negotiations show an average increase of about 3.5% across Stockholm County, including roughly 3.5% in Stockholm municipality itself.
So renters are still paying more. What has changed is the speed. Sweden went through unusually large rent rises in 2023, 2024 and 2025, and the latest settlements are smaller.
The second-hand market is less straightforward. Qasa’s latest geographical analysis found inner-city Stockholm rents up 3.5% over a year, while second-hand rents outside the inner-city tolls fell 2.5%. Stockholm remains expensive, but prices are no longer moving upward everywhere at once.
| Stockholm rental market | Latest useful change | Direction | What is happening now |
|---|---|---|---|
| Greater Stockholm ordinary rents | +4.7% in 2025 | Up | Strong increase |
| Stockholm County negotiated rents | about +3.5% in 2026 | Up | Still rising, but slower |
| Inner-city second-hand rents | +3.5% | Up | Central demand remains strong |
| Second-hand rents outside the inner city | -2.5% | Down | Some price pressure has reversed |
Why can two people in Stockholm pay completely different rents for similar apartments?
Stockholm effectively has several rental markets, and the price gap between them can easily reach thousands of kronor a month.
A tenant with a normal first-hand contract usually pays a negotiated rent. Someone who needs an apartment immediately and turns to the second-hand market faces prices much closer to what current supply and demand will support.
Qasa’s 2025 Stockholm figures put the median second-hand rent around SEK 11,000 for a one-room apartment, SEK 14,500 for two rooms and SEK 18,000 for three rooms or more. Comparable ordinary rents used in the same analysis were around SEK 6,249, SEK 8,149 and SEK 11,162.
For a two-room apartment, that leaves a gap of about SEK 6,350 every month. Over one year, the second-hand tenant pays roughly SEK 76,000 more.
Access explains much of that difference. Stockholm’s municipal housing agency says the average queue time for an existing rental apartment was 9.6 years in 2025. Someone moving to Stockholm today cannot simply decide to take the SEK 8,000 first-hand apartment instead of the SEK 14,500 second-hand one.
| Apartment size | Ordinary rent | Second-hand median | Approx. premium |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 room | SEK 6,249 | SEK 11,000 | +76% |
| 2 rooms | SEK 8,149 | SEK 14,500 | +78% |
| 3+ rooms | SEK 11,162 | SEK 18,000 | +61% |
Get fresh and reliable data on the Stockholm property market
New waterfront blocks were priced at the top of the last cycle and are still asking for it, with a monthly fee to match. Where asking prices sit furthest from what flats actually resell for.
Have Stockholm rents just had an unusually bad few years?
Yes. The recent rise in Stockholm rents has been much larger than the increases Swedish renters were used to before the inflation shock.
Statistics Sweden’s national series gives useful context because Stockholm’s negotiated market was exposed to the same cost pressures. Swedish rents rose just 0.8% in 2016, 0.8% in 2017, 1.1% in 2018 and 1.9% in both 2019 and 2020. The increase reached 4.1% in 2023, 5.0% in 2024 and 4.6% in 2025. The 2024 figure was the highest since 1993.
Stockholm’s municipal landlords followed a similar path. Their average increase was around 4.45% in 2023. Stockholmshem and Familjebostäder then raised rents by roughly 5.3% in 2024, 4.69% in 2025 and about 3.5% in 2026.
Compounding those increases gives roughly 19%. A tenant paying SEK 10,000 before that sequence would now be close to SEK 11,900 if the apartment received those typical adjustments.
The latest 3.5% rise looks calmer only next to the previous three years. For renters looking at their monthly bill today, the accumulated increase is already large.
| Year | Typical increase at major Stockholm municipal landlords | SEK 10,000 starting rent after increase |
|---|---|---|
| 2023 | about +4.45% | SEK 10,445 |
| 2024 | about +5.3% | SEK 10,999 |
| 2025 | about +4.69% | SEK 11,515 |
| 2026 | about +3.5% | SEK 11,918 |
Are Stockholm rents still rising even though inflation has fallen?
Yes. Stockholm rents are currently rising much faster than headline inflation, partly because negotiated rents respond to landlord costs with a delay.
During the inflation shock, property owners were hit by higher interest rates, heating bills, maintenance costs, construction costs and municipal charges. Rent negotiations then pushed a larger share of those increases into tenants’ monthly payments over several years.
Today, the broader inflation picture is much calmer. Preliminary Statistics Sweden data have recently put CPIF inflation below 1%, while Stockholm County’s 2026 rent settlements average around 3.5%.
That gap helps explain why renters can feel out of sync with the inflation headlines. General prices may barely be rising, while an apartment costing SEK 10,000 receives another increase of roughly SEK 350 a month.
The good news for tenants is that the direction has clearly improved. Rent increases around 3.5% are smaller than the 4% to 5% jumps seen during the worst part of the recent cycle. Falling inflation and lower financing pressure make another acceleration less likely unless landlord costs turn upward again.
Everything a foreign buyer should know before buying in Stockholm
The pack also covers the debt sitting inside the housing association, and the board that has to approve you first.
Is central Stockholm still getting more expensive while the suburbs get cheaper?
Yes, at least in the second-hand market. Inner-city Stockholm has recently become more expensive while many areas farther out have moved the other way.
Qasa compared second-hand listings and rents between 2024 and 2025 and found inner-city rents up 3.5%. Outside the inner-city tolls, average rents fell 2.5%.
For a roughly 30-square-metre one-room apartment, Qasa put the average inner-city second-hand rent at about SEK 14,000 a month. Across Greater Stockholm, the equivalent average was around SEK 10,100.
A few metro stops can therefore change the monthly bill substantially. Qasa highlighted places such as Mariatorget and Slussen, where rents remained strong, while areas such as Liljeholmen and Telefonplan offered noticeably cheaper alternatives.
The same geographical hierarchy appears in ordinary first-hand rents. Statistics Sweden’s 2025 data put average annual rent at roughly SEK 1,951 per square metre on Södermalm and SEK 1,948 on Kungsholmen. Skärholmen was around SEK 1,487 and Järva around SEK 1,521.
For a 60-square-metre apartment, the Södermalm-to-Skärholmen gap works out to roughly SEK 2,300 a month using those district averages.
Central Stockholm still has much more pricing power. The recent fall outside the centre also shows that renters will trade location for affordability once prices become uncomfortable.
| Stockholm district | Average annual rent/m² in 2025 | Approx. monthly rent for 60 m² |
|---|---|---|
| Södermalm | SEK 1,951 | SEK 9,755 |
| Kungsholmen | SEK 1,948 | SEK 9,740 |
| Norra innerstaden | SEK 1,869 | SEK 9,345 |
| Bromma | SEK 1,859 | SEK 9,295 |
| Järva | SEK 1,521 | SEK 7,605 |
| Skärholmen | SEK 1,487 | SEK 7,435 |
Why are Stockholm second-hand rents so expensive?
Stockholm second-hand rents are expensive mainly because tenants are paying for immediate access to housing that is extremely difficult to obtain through the normal queue.
Bostadsförmedlingen says the average queue time across all homes it allocated in 2025 was nine years. For existing apartments, the average reached 9.6 years.
Those waiting times change how we should read Stockholm rent prices. A relatively inexpensive first-hand apartment may exist, but that price is irrelevant to many newcomers because they cannot obtain the contract when they need it.
The contrast becomes obvious with a two-room apartment. Qasa’s second-hand median was around SEK 14,500, compared with roughly SEK 8,149 for an ordinary rental in the comparison it published. The second-hand premium is close to 80%.
This helps explain why Stockholm can have negotiated rents that look moderate by international capital-city standards while still feeling brutally expensive to someone arriving for work or study. The costly part is often getting access now.
The areas and new projects in Stockholm that are most overpriced
New waterfront blocks were priced at the top of the last cycle and are still asking for it, with a monthly fee to match. Where asking prices sit furthest from what flats actually resell for.
Are first-hand rents in Stockholm still cheap?
First-hand Stockholm rents can still be excellent value compared with the second-hand market, but calling them cheap today is increasingly difficult.
Statistics Sweden put Greater Stockholm’s average rent at SEK 141 per square metre per month in 2025. A three-room apartment in Greater Stockholm averaged SEK 10,139 a month.
Those numbers remain well below many second-hand asking rents, especially in central Stockholm. They have also risen sharply over the past few years. As seen above, typical municipal rent adjustments since 2023 compound to around 19%.
There is another clue in tenant behaviour. Stockholm’s housing queue remains extremely long for existing apartments even after several years of large rent increases. People are still willing to wait many years for those contracts because the alternative is often substantially more expensive.
So a first-hand contract still carries real economic value. The rent itself is harder to call cheap now; what makes the contract attractive is how much a tenant may avoid paying on the second-hand market.
Is Stockholm more expensive to rent than Gothenburg and Malmö?
Stockholm is clearly the most expensive of Sweden’s three big cities for second-hand tenants, although ordinary first-hand rent comparisons are more mixed.
Statistics Sweden’s 2025 ordinary-rent data put Greater Stockholm at SEK 141 per square metre per month. Greater Malmö was close behind at SEK 136, while Greater Gothenburg averaged SEK 127.
The second-hand gap is much wider. Qasa’s median rent for a two-room apartment was around SEK 14,500 in Stockholm, compared with SEK 11,500 in Gothenburg and SEK 11,000 in Malmö. A Stockholm tenant was therefore paying roughly SEK 3,000 more each month than a Gothenburg tenant and SEK 3,500 more than someone in Malmö.
One-room apartments showed the same pattern: around SEK 11,000 in Stockholm, SEK 9,500 in Gothenburg and SEK 8,200 in Malmö.
For someone who can enter the ordinary rental system, Stockholm’s premium is relatively modest. For someone searching privately today, the Stockholm premium becomes much harder to ignore.
| Rental market | Stockholm | Gothenburg | Malmö |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ordinary rent per m² | SEK 141 | SEK 127 | SEK 136 |
| Second-hand 1 room | SEK 11,000 | SEK 9,500 | SEK 8,200 |
| Second-hand 2 rooms | SEK 14,500 | SEK 11,500 | SEK 11,000 |
| Second-hand 3+ rooms | SEK 18,000 | SEK 14,500 | SEK 14,200 |
What developers and sellers promise that you should never pay for
A price agreed years before the keys exist, a monthly fee that only holds while the developer still owns flats, and a completion date. What a promise is worth without a contract behind it.
Why are new rental apartments in Stockholm so expensive?
New rental apartments are among the expensive parts of Stockholm’s first-hand market because modern construction costs much more to deliver than the older housing stock.
Statistics Sweden’s latest nationwide new-build survey found that rental apartments completed in 2024 averaged SEK 2,326 per square metre per year. That was 13.2% above the corresponding figure for homes completed in 2023, far ahead of the 5% increase recorded across the overall rental stock that year.
Greater Stockholm had the highest new-build rents among the major regions.
Stockholm’s housing queue shows how tenants react to that price difference. Existing apartments allocated through Bostadsförmedlingen required an average 9.6 years in the queue in 2025. New production averaged just 5.8 years.
That four-year gap is hard to explain without price playing a major role. New apartments give renters a faster route into a first-hand contract, but many households are unwilling or unable to pay enough to compete for them.
Even landlords acknowledge the pressure. Stockholmshem’s general 2026 increase is around 3.5%, yet a group of its newest properties with the highest rents received a smaller 2.75% increase.
High-priced new construction can add supply without solving Stockholm’s shortage of affordable rentals.
| Bostadsförmedlingen rental type | Average queue time in 2025 |
|---|---|
| Existing rental stock | 9.6 years |
| New construction | 5.8 years |
| All allocated homes | 9.0 years |
Is Stockholm’s housing queue finally getting shorter?
No. Stockholm’s rental queue remains extremely long, even though the housing agency is allocating a record number of homes.
Bostadsförmedlingen allocated 20,861 homes in 2025, the highest number since the agency began operating in 1947. It was also the third consecutive year above 20,000 allocations.
Despite that record turnover, the average queue time across all allocations reached nine years, 0.2 years longer than in 2024. For existing homes, the average was 9.6 years.
There is some movement at the bottom of the market. During 2025, 1,725 rentals went to people with queue times between zero and two years. But more than half of ordinary rental apartments went to applicants who had waited between 3.7 and 13 years, and central Stockholm generally requires longer waits.
The queue is still telling us something important about rent pressure today. Stockholm may have apartments available, but well-priced first-hand apartments remain heavily oversubscribed.
How to spot hidden problems when you visit a flat in Stockholm
The flat matters less than the association's annual report, and a pipe replacement that has not been done yet is a fee rise waiting to happen. What to look at, and what each number means.
Is Stockholm building enough rentals to bring rents down?
No. Stockholm is building more homes again, but current construction still looks too small and too expensive to push rents broadly downward.
The collapse in Swedish housing construction after interest rates rose created a particularly weak pipeline. Building activity has since started to recover, which should gradually give tenants more choice.
The harder problem is what gets built. Newly produced rental apartments come with much higher rents than older stock, and Stockholm renters already need much shorter queue times to obtain them. More expensive new supply therefore does not relieve the part of the market under the greatest pressure as effectively as the headline construction number suggests.
There is also a timing problem. Apartments started today usually reach tenants years later. Even a strong rebound in construction cannot quickly erase a rental queue measured in years.
For Stockholm rents to face serious downward pressure, we would need sustained additions of apartments at prices large numbers of households are willing to pay. The market is currently nowhere near that point.
Could second-hand rents in Stockholm start falling more widely?
Yes. Second-hand Stockholm rents could fall farther outside the strongest central locations, and we already have evidence that this process has started.
The 2.5% decline recorded by Qasa outside the inner-city tolls is the clearest example. It shows that Stockholm’s private rental market does have a price ceiling. When tenants can move a few stations farther out, landlords face more competition.
Lower mortgage rates could reinforce that effect. Owners who previously needed very high rents to cover financing costs may have more room to accept lower offers. A healthier home-sales market can also change the pool of apartments being rented out temporarily.
Central Stockholm is harder to call. Qasa still recorded a 3.5% rise there, with an average roughly 30-square-metre second-hand one-room apartment around SEK 14,000 a month. Limited supply and unusually strong demand for central locations continue to support those prices.
So further Stockholm-wide second-hand rent inflation is far from guaranteed. We would currently expect more geographical divergence: firm rents in prime central areas and much more resistance farther out.
The unwritten rules of the bidding round, and why nothing binds
A winning bid holds nobody until the contract is signed, so a higher one can still arrive days later. How the rounds actually run, how far above asking things go, and how to avoid bidding blind.
Could ordinary first-hand rents in Stockholm actually fall?
A broad fall in Stockholm first-hand rents looks very unlikely for now.
Sweden’s negotiated rental system tends to produce annual adjustments rather than frequent nominal cuts. Landlords continue to face wage costs, maintenance, utilities, renovations and other operating expenses even after inflation falls.
The latest settlements support that view. Stockholm County rents are rising around 3.5% in 2026. Across individual municipalities, Hyresgästföreningen’s figures mostly sit in a fairly narrow range around 3% to 4%.
A slowdown is much easier to imagine than an outright decline. If inflation stays low, interest costs remain manageable and construction improves, future negotiations could move closer to the small annual increases common before 2023.
For actual rent cuts to become widespread, Stockholm would probably need a much looser housing market with persistent vacancies and landlords competing aggressively for tenants. A nine-year average housing queue tells us how far the city remains from that situation.
Will Sweden’s new private-rental rules make Stockholm rents more expensive?
The new private-rental rules could lift rents in the most desirable parts of Stockholm, although it is still too early to say how large the effect will be.
Since July 2026, Sweden has changed the rules governing private rentals of owner-occupied homes. The previous formula linking reasonable rent partly to the home’s market value and interest rates has been removed. A rent can now be adjusted when it sits substantially above the level generally charged for comparable private rentals.
The rules also make private letting easier in several situations. Individuals can fall under the new framework when renting out up to two homes, provided the activity does not cross into the regular letting of more than two apartments, and condominium owners have somewhat more room to receive permission for subletting.
That creates two forces pulling against each other in Stockholm. Easier letting could put more homes on the market and increase competition. At the same time, using comparable private rents gives high-priced central areas a clearer local benchmark.
The first effect could help tenants in places with plenty of alternative listings. The second could support expensive rents around Stockholm’s most sought-after locations.
We should be cautious here because the rules have only recently taken effect. Unlike the 3.5% negotiated increase or the Qasa price changes, there is not yet enough post-reform data to claim a measurable Stockholm-wide impact.
We have prepared 12 documents to help you invest well in Stockholm
What each area costs, how long a flat sits before it sells, and what you are actually allowed to do with it. Plus the things nobody writes down: the debt sitting inside the housing association, and the board that has to approve you first.
Are newcomers getting hit hardest by Stockholm rents?
Yes. Newcomers face the worst version of Stockholm’s rental market because they usually combine the shortest queue history with the highest need for immediate housing.
A newcomer looking for a two-room apartment can easily face a second-hand median around SEK 14,500 a month. Someone already holding a normal rental contract might pay closer to SEK 8,000 to SEK 10,000 for a broadly comparable apartment.
At the SEK 14,500 median, one year of rent costs SEK 174,000 before electricity, internet and other household expenses. Compared with the roughly SEK 8,149 ordinary-rent benchmark, the additional annual cost is more than SEK 76,000.
Waiting for the cheaper option is rarely realistic. Existing homes allocated through Stockholm’s housing agency required 9.6 years in the queue on average in 2025.
This produces one of Stockholm’s biggest housing inequalities: two households can live in similar apartments in the same city while one spends thousands of kronor more every month mainly because one household arrived later.
For workers moving to Stockholm, international arrivals, students and recently separated households, current second-hand rents are therefore much more relevant than the citywide first-hand average.
So, is rent getting more expensive in Stockholm?
Yes. Stockholm rent is still getting more expensive today, but the broad surge of the past few years is cooling and the second-hand market has started to split sharply by location.
The 2026 picture is fairly clear. Negotiated rents across Stockholm County are rising about 3.5%, after much larger increases during the previous three years. Compounding typical increases at the major municipal landlords since 2023 gives roughly 19%, so tenants are already paying from a much higher starting point.
At the same time, Stockholm no longer looks like a market where every rent rises together. Qasa found second-hand rents up 3.5% in the inner city and down 2.5% outside the tolls. That is a meaningful break from the recent pattern and probably the best evidence that affordability is starting to cap prices in weaker locations.
The deeper problem has barely changed. Existing first-hand apartments still require around 9.6 years in the municipal queue. New apartments are easier to obtain but much more expensive. A second-hand two-room apartment can cost around SEK 14,500 a month, roughly SEK 6,000 more than an ordinary rental benchmark.
So we expect Stockholm rents to keep rising overall for now, although much more slowly than during the recent inflation shock. First-hand tenants are more likely to see modest annual increases than rent cuts. Central second-hand renters remain exposed to high prices. Farther from the centre, tenants finally have some evidence that rents can move down as well as up.
That distinction now matters more than the Stockholm average. If you already have a first-hand contract, rent is getting gradually more expensive. If you need an apartment immediately in central Stockholm, it remains very expensive and can still get pricier. If you are flexible about location, the market is starting to give you more negotiating power.
Everything a foreign buyer should know before buying in Stockholm
The pack also covers the debt sitting inside the housing association, and the board that has to approve you first.
OUR METHODOLOGY
This analysis tests whether rent is getting more expensive in Stockholm by separating the city’s main rental markets instead of relying on one blended average. We compare ordinary first-hand rents, completed 2026 rent negotiations, second-hand rents, district-level differences, queue times, new-build rents, housing supply, inflation, financing conditions and the July 2026 private-rental reform.
Different sources are used for different parts of the question. Statistics Sweden provides the broad official view of ordinary rents, historical rent changes, apartment-size and district-level rent data, new-build rents, inflation and housing construction. Hyresgästföreningen’s completed settlements are used for the current 2026 first-hand rent changes in Stockholm.
For the second-hand market, we use Qasa’s Stockholm rental data because official rent statistics do not provide the same timely view of privately sublet homes. We keep that market separate from first-hand rents rather than combining the two into one headline number.
Bostadsförmedlingen i Stockholm is used to measure access to first-hand housing, including the 2025 allocation total and average queue times for existing rentals, new construction and all allocated homes. Queue data is read alongside rent levels because a lower first-hand rent is not a practical alternative for a renter who cannot obtain the contract when needed.
Historical rent increases are used to distinguish the current slowdown from the unusually large 2023–2025 cycle. Where the article compounds successive annual increases, converts annual rent per square metre into a monthly figure, or calculates first-hand versus second-hand premiums, those figures are our calculations from the published data.
Construction and new-build data are used to judge whether additional supply is likely to put meaningful downward pressure on rents. We also use the Riksbank’s policy-rate history and Statistics Sweden’s latest inflation data to assess the cost backdrop facing landlords, without assuming that rent negotiations move one-for-one with current inflation.
For the July 2026 private-rental reform, we rely on Sveriges Domstolar for the new legal framework. Because the rules only recently took effect, we treat them as a change in the forces shaping the market, not as proof of a measurable Stockholm-wide rent effect.
Key sources used for this analysis include: Statistics Sweden on rent levels and changes by region, Statistics Sweden on the 2025 rental stock and historical rent increases, Statistics Sweden’s district-level rent database, Hyresgästföreningen on 2026 Stockholm rent negotiations, Bostadsförmedlingen i Stockholm on 2025 allocations and queue times, Qasa on Stockholm second-hand rents, Statistics Sweden on new-build rents, Boverket on metropolitan housing-market conditions, the Riksbank on policy rates, Statistics Sweden’s August 2026 inflation estimate, and Sveriges Domstolar on the 2026 rental-rule changes.
The research was updated using information available through 10 September 2026. The conclusion is based on the direction and consistency of these separate pieces of evidence rather than on a single Stockholm rent figure.
The areas and new projects in Stockholm that are most overpriced
New waterfront blocks were priced at the top of the last cycle and are still asking for it, with a monthly fee to match. Where asking prices sit furthest from what flats actually resell for.
Related blog posts
- How expensive are apartments in Stockholm right now?
- Is buying property in Stockholm risky for foreigners?
- Should you buy rental property in Stockholm now?
- How profitable is renting out an apartment in Stockholm?
- Where is the property market in Stockholm heading?
- What fees should you expect when buying property in Stockholm?
