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PROPERTY LAW
Types of ownership
Freehold
Ownership
• Under Swedish law, any legal entity or natural person may
own real estate. The ownership of a real property (which has
always defined borders and a registered name and number),
is registered in the Swedish Land Code. The ownership of a
real property in Sweden has a strong protection. With the
ownership of the real property come the real-estate rights
described further below.
• Title, transfer or mortgages as well as certain encumbrances
(such as easement) must be registered in the Swedish Land
Register (Sw. Fastighetsregistret).
• Not only the land, but also fixtures (both physical and legal)
belong to the real property (and therefore the ownership).
With regard to physical fixtures, the principal rule is that it
must have been provided by the owner of the real property to
become real property.
Co-ownership
• Several persons, again natural as well as legal, may co-own
Swedish real properties. However, such co-ownership cannot
regard a specific, physical part of the real property unit, but
will be an economic percentage of the real property as a
whole (the purchase is otherwise invalid).
• In using and disposing the real property, the co-owners must
in principal agree. There is a certain statute providing what
will apply if the co-owners do not agree (for example, a co-
owner can force public auction).
Three dimensional property formation
• Division of a real property into units, stacked horizontally
and/or vertically, each with its own straightforward right of
ownership entitling its owner to build within the limits of the
unit and with no share in or right of ownership on common
parts (however often solved with easements, see further
below, for e.g. upper 3D properties to stairwells and elevators
on lower 3D properties).
• Are often used for real property complexes in which the
same real property is to be held separately by various owners
(private as well as public entities) for different uses.
• Must be suitable for containing a building or part of a building.
It is further required that the 3D property leads to a more
efficient management of the building or that it is required in
order to finance the construction of it.
Rights of use of real property
• Under the Swedish Land Code there are several different
rights of use of real property, where (commercially) the
most important ones are ground lease (Sw. arrende) and
tenancy. Other common rights of use are site-leasehold (Sw.
tomträtt) and easements. All these rights of use are based on
agreements, where however easement can also be created by
resolution by the surveyor’s office.
Ground lease
• Is a right for the lessee to lease land on a real property for a
long term.
• There are four different types of ground leases depending on
what the purpose of leasing the land is and, depending on the
purpose, the regulation is unequally strict with regard to the
protection of the lessee.
Tenancy
• Is a right for the tenant to, permanently, use a house or part
of a house on the real property for a rent. The regulation
on tenancy is extensive and in most parts mandatory for
the benefit of the tenant (however, the rules regarding
commercial premises are not as strict in this manner
compared to residences).
Site-leasehold
• Is a right for the lessee to lease the land of a real property (the
entire real property) for, in principal, an eternal period of time.
• Can only be granted by a governmental body, such as a
municipality. The lessee owns the buildings on the property
and has in many ways equal rights to the property as he
would have if he was the owner of it (he is e.g. entitled to
assign the site-leasehold or to grant other rights of use to it).
Easement
• Is a burden imposed upon a property, for the use and utility
of another property, based on either an agreement under the
Swedish Land Code or an official resolution by the surveyor
office.
• Is exercised to the detriment of the property assets which
they encumber – servient land – and to the benefit of
adjoining assets which they enhance – dominant land.
• As an attribute of the right of ownership, easements are
transferred with the related tenement.
• While the owner of a dominant land may, at its expense, carry
out any work required to use or to preserve the easement, it
is not entitled to do anything to aggravate the situation of the
servient land; the owner of the servient land must allow the
easement to be exercised without doing anything to restrict it.
Lien on real property
Mortgage
• Is a safe security (corresponding to a certain monetary
amount) encumbering the real property, which entitles the
beneficiary to a preferential right over other creditors to the
owner in the event of a forced sale of the real property. In
order to be entitled to such security, the beneficiary must
have had a mortgage deed provided to him from the owner or,
in case the mortgage is only electronic, be registered in the
Swedish Land Register (which is most common today).
• Confers a right entitling a secured creditor to take possession
of the asset offered as security, even if it is in the possession
of a third party.
• Any real property in Sweden may be mortgaged and there is
no limit on the number of mortgages that may be created over
the same property.
• Is usually the normal security for bank institutes when the
acquisition of a real property is financed by a bank loan.
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Investors Guide to Europe 2015