The SwedishUnion of Tenants

Content

3 The Swedish Union of Tenants

4 Organisation

5 Main activities

6 Housing estate activities

7 Recruiting members

8 Why becoming a member?

11 Negotiations

14 Political pressure

17 The legal aspects

18 Study and educational activities

19 Publications

20 Environment and housing development

22 International contacts

23 Facts

The Swedish Union of Tenants

The Swedish Union of Tenants work to improve housing and living conditions, for fair and reasonable rents, and forinfluence and participation in decision-making processes.

Short history The Swedish Union of Tenants was founded in but thefirst known tenants’ association in Sweden was already for-med in . The oldest tenants’ association still in opera-tion was established , in Nynäshamn south ofStockholm.

■ In the tenants’ association in Stockholm formedthe National Association of Tenants’ Savings andBuilding Societies (now ) with the aim of buildingflats at affordable costs for its members.

■ In the national association adopted its first rentnegotiation procedure.

■ In the Swedish Parliament passed the RentControl Act and a rent-freeze was introduced. This Actsurvived until .

■ In , in connection with deregulation of rentswithin the municipal housing companies, an agreementwas made on a voluntary negotiation procedure betwe-en the municipal non-profit housing companies andrepresentatives of the tenants.

■ In the remains of rent control were abolished andthe Rent Negotiation Act was introduced, allowing thetenant’s associations to negotiate the rents throughoutthe country.

Organisation

The Swedish Union of Tenants consists of associations atregional level, about associations (sections) at munici-pal level and around , local tenant associations at estatelevel. In the union has , members, of which, are elected representatives of their local associations.

The National Secretariat in Stockholm, with some employees, has the overall responsibility for about localemployees. The Secretariat is organised in different areassuch as; housing policy, legal issues, rent negotiations,environment, information and communication, internatio-nal affairs, administration and finances.

Regional level: 10 associations

Estate level: 3,000 local tenant associations

Municipal level:200 associations

Main activities

The Swedish Tenants Union is a members organisation.Our main goal is to ensure the right to good housing at anaffordable and fair rent and to guarantee a security of tenu-re and provide a sense of community.

■ We represent the tenants when we annually negotiatethe rents for tenants in the municipal housing stock.The results also, by law, become a target and a maxi-mum when the rents are set in the privately ownedrental stock. (Read more about rent negotiations onpage .)

■ we rouse public opinion and lobby political policymakers in favour of rights to good housing at afford-able rents,

■ we support our members in relations between themand their landlords,

■ we aim at a housing standard, quality and rent inreasonable proportion to each other,

■ we inform members on tenants’ rights and obligationsand train volunteer staff.

Housing estate activities

The , local tenants associations provide for a solid baseof the tenants’ association. These associations, about %of the total number of housing estates, carry out the activi-ties that take place in the housing estates.

The area of activity usually covers one housing estate orblock, but may also be an individual building. The mem-bers of the tenants’ association living in the estate elect theboard of the local tenant association. The board, throughdifferent activities, spread knowledge of the objectives andnecessity of a tenant association. These activities are prima-rily for recruiting new members. However their task is alsoto develop leisure, cultural and social activities within thehousing estate. Through agreements, the local tenant associ-ations have been able to influence maintenance, shaping ofplaygrounds, replacement of interior fixtures etc.

The regional and local tenant associations have to someextent also been able to influence the level of rent, in addi-tion to the general rent setting. There is a growing policy togive the local tenant association the opportunity of negotia-ting rents on the estate. Through the board of the localtenant association tenants can influence both services andstandards through negotiations.

Recruiting members

Within the tenant association the membership recruitmentis done mainly by professional recruiters at a local level.These recruiters get paid through a commission-basedsalary. There is an organisation for membership develop-ment with paid staff working actively for recruitment foreach regional tenant association. In order to maintain goodperformance the recruiters are continuously trained in sales,customers relations and quality work.

Most members are recruited through personal calls fromrecruiters, by telephone and by various media campaigns,both in newspapers and through television commercials.

Why becoming a member?

As a member of the tenant association, he or she gain accessto information from lawyers and other personal advicers,and also through the website together with a personal code.Furthermore, the members benefit by many other offersthrough his or her membership.

Becoming a member has several advantages:■ Free help and advice on all issues concerning

housing

■ Free legal assistance in the event of a dispute withthe landlord

■ Inspection of the apartment on arrival and ondeparture

■ Having professionals negotiating the rent

■ Moderation of rent increases

■ Local information on matters concerning housing

■ Pressure on decision-makers, i.e. mobilisation ofpublic opinion. Fair housing policy.

■ Becoming part of the ”No to market rents” cam-paign

■ Influence in the members’ housing situation

■ Educational, study and leisure activities

■ The magazine Vår bostad (Our Dwelling) – see”Publications”

■ Local leisure offers and discounts from variouscompanies

Negotiations

Sweden has nearly 1.6 million rental dwellings. About860,000 are owned by municipal housing companies withthe aim of operating without interest of profit. Private land-lords, who may be private individuals or legal entities, ownanother 710,000 dwellings.

Rental agreementsThe basic for tenancy is therental agreement made bythe tenant and the landlord.The rental agreement is acontract governed by civillaw, regulating the size ofthe rent and other terms ofthe lease. No down pay-ments are made in connec-tion with right of tenancyin Sweden.

Negotiations andnegotiation procedureAbout % of all housingrents in Sweden areestablished following negotiations between tenants’ associa-tion and the landlord. A property owners’ association oftenrepresents a private landlord.

The right to negotiate is based on a negotiation procedu-re, with rules on the implementation of negotiations. Theparties in a negotiation procedure are the Tenants’Association and the landlord. Most flats are covered by the

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860,000owned by municipal housing companies

710,000owned by

private landlords

million

negotiation procedure as the rental agreement usually con-tains a clause, which stipulates this procedure.

Both employed negotiators and elected representativesfrom the tenants’ association participate in negotiations.

The negotiation clause includes a provision, indicatingthe tenant’s consent to the parties in the negotiation proce-dure, that agreements can be made on the actual rent andother rental conditions. However, the individual tenant isentitled to opt out of the negotiation procedure and insteadmake an agreement directly with the landlord concerningthe rent setting and other conditions.

Two different ways of rent settingThe rent setting in the municipal housing companies isbased on a prime cost principle. On the private market therents are set with reference to the rents of equivalent dwell-ings in the neighbourhood, owned and managed by amunicipal housing company.

Negotiation payment As tenants’ association also negotiate for tenants who arenot members, the Rent Negotiation Act includes a facilityfor the tenants’ association to obtain a negotiation fee fromthe tenants.

This negotiation fee amounts to about (, ) per month and flat, which may be compared tothe membership fee of about ( ) a month.

Political pressure

The Swedish Union of Tenants has a Tenant Programme,which is discussed once a year at the Annual Meeting. Theprogramme expresses the tenant associations’ fundamentalviews.

On the basis of this programme, the Swedish Union ofTenants can then state, in greater detail, proposal on how tofinance new and existing housing, how to improve buildingregulations and the city environment, etc.

The Swedish Union of Tenants tries to obtain supportfor its demands by lobbying politicians both formally andinformally. The Swedish Government often sends politicalmotions to the Swedish Union of Tenants and other organi-sations for consideration. We also keep in contact withpoliticians and decision makers to keep them informed ofthe our current views and work in progress, e.g. in terms ofnegotiations and other forms of tenant participation.

The legal aspects

The Swedish Union of Tenants aims at achieving changes inlegislation with the objective of strengthening the positionof tenants and their security of tenure. Our full-timeemployed ombudsmen help members in disputes.

The ombudsmen may relate to collective negotiations orto individual rent disputes. Initially assistance is aimed attrying to reach voluntarily agreements with the landlord bymeans of negotiations. If this is not successful, it is possibleto resort to legal means to settle the dispute, i.e. go tocourt. In court, the ombudsman represents the members inthe same way as solicitors represent their clients.

The ombudsmen within the tenants’ association usuallyhave much better knowledge of rent legislation than manysolicitors have. Our individual members, through theirmembership, are offered legal assistance, and they have theright to be represented in court by the tenants’ associationat no extra charges.

Study and educational activities

The tenant associations arrange local training seminars forabout , members annually. These seminars can dealwith issues such as economics, legal matters and tenants’rights, environment issues, consumer issues, quality etc.The organisation has a special training programme foryounger members.

Publications

All members receive the monthly magazine Vår bostad(Our dwelling), which is the largest periodical magazine inSweden with an edition of one million copies. The magazi-ne reaches % of the Swedish households. Vår bostad is afamily magazine focusing on housing matters such as interi-or decorating and conversion, Readers’ Queries, tenant –landlord issues, cooking etc.

Vår bostad is jointly owned by the Swedish Union ofTenants and , The Tenant Owners Co-operation (flatowners in housing associations) The editor is independentof the owners.

Elected representatives and others active in the organisa-tion receives Hyresgästen (The Tenant), with an edition of, copies. The local tenant associations also publishtheir own magazines at local, municipal or regional level.

Environment and housing development

The Swedish Union of Tenants works to improve the inter-nal environment in existing dwellings and is also trying todevelop methods for bringing in healthy building materialsin newly constructed or converted/renovated houses.

One way to improve the indoor climate is to negotiatewith the landlords to have them doing regularly check-upson basic aspects, such as air quality, damp and mould,noise, temperature and light. This is carried out by environ-mental audits of areas that are considered to have majorimpact on peoples’ health.

There are many different methods for auditing and exa-mining the environmental status of properties. The methodused by the tenants’ association is the only one based ontenant’s experiences. Therefore, the tenants are asked to co-operate during the audit.

A programme, Healthy Housing, has been designed fornew or renovated buildings. The programme is a co-opera-tion between the tenants’ association, representatives fromtenant’s owner’s organisations () and house owners/land-lords.

The tenant’s association is also planning for sustainableurban development. This entails the physical planning thatdetermine the environment – the outdoor and indoor cli-mate, transports, public services, security, comfort and wellbeing on the housing estates. This should also secure the airand water quality of today and in the future.

International contacts

The Swedish Union of Tenants is a member of theInternational Union of Tenants, , and has also beenappointed by the Congress to host the Secretariat.Today the has got national and regional tenant orga-nisations countries. The main purpose of the is tosafeguard the interests of tenants, throughout the world.

The is in consultative status with the United NationsEconomical and Social Council, -. The isalso member of the Habitat Committee and of theEuropean Housing Forum, a network of national Europeanorganisation working in the fields of housing, homelessness,and other urban issues.

Publication: The Global Tenant, issued quarterly Address: IUT, P.O. Box 7514, SE-103 92 Stockholm,SwedenTel. +46-8 791 02 25, fax. +46-8-20 43 44E-mail: info@iut.nuInternet: www.iut.nu

You can also visit the Swedish Union of Tenants onwww.hyresgastforeningen.se

Facts■ Number of members: 545,000 households

■ Number of elected representatives: 14,000

■ Number of estate representatives: 2,000

■ Number of employees: 880

■ Local tenants associations: 3,000

■ Associations at municipal level: 184

■ Associations at regional level: 10

■ 54% of the members live in non-profit housing utilities

■ 46% of the members live in dwellings owned by privatecompanies

■ Age and number of the members:0–20 7,000 51–60 85,000

21–30 111,000 61–70 55,00031–40 117,000 71–80 50,00041–50 95,000 80– 25,000

■ Members, sex:55% are women45% are men

One family houses

Co-operatives (for profit)

Private landlords

Municipal housing

Public owned22%

17%

18%

42%

1%

Housing Market in Sweden, 2001

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