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Housing minister stymied in Stockholm flat hunt

Sweden's Minister for Public Administration and Housing Stefan Attefall has been left empty handed as he struggles to find an available apartment in Stockholm to meet his budget and needs, according to a report in the Metro newspaper.

Published: 11 April 2011 15:05 CEST

Housing minister stymied in Stockholm flat hunt

“I have among other things looked at a one bedroom apartment in Vasastan,” Attefall said of his hitherto unsuccessful attempt to find a home in the city notorious for an ill-functioning rental market and high property prices.

In the meantime the Christian Democrat has been forced to remain in an apartment intended for members of Sweden’s Riksdag, a position he relinquished on becoming a minister in October 2010.

The taxpayer-funded apartments are intended for the exclusive use of current members, and his replacement in the Riksdag, Andrea Carlsson, has become a victim of Attefall’s forlorn search for a suitable abode, Metro reports.

Carlsson ultimately tired of waiting, opting instead to invest in a one bedroom apartment in the Kristineberg area of the city.

Stefan Attefall is however not alone in overstaying his welcome in a Riksdag apartment, the newspaper reports, with Christian Democrat party leader and social minister Göran Hägglund also currently remaining in his studio near Munkbron in the city centre.

While Göran Hägglund has been a minister since 2006, his press secretary declined to comment on why he has not relinquished his Riksdag apartment.

The stock of apartments are intended to ensure that Riksdag members have somewhere to stay when on business in the city and are allocated according to the division of mandates.

René Poedtke at the Riksdag property unit told Metro that the apartments are however handed over to parties to allocate.

“How these are allocated is in the first instance an internal party issue,” he said.

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How to avoid taxi scams at Stockholm's Arlanda Airport

Check the comparison price

Tourists and foreigners are often the target of unlicensed taxi operators, so if you’re getting a taxi in Sweden, always check the window for a yellow and white sign with the jämförpris or comparison price, as well as yellow registration plates at the front and back of the vehicle.

This is a legal requirement and will show you the price of a 10 kilometre journey taking 15 minutes at different times of day, although beware that they are allowed to add an extra fee for pickup/dropoff at stations or terminals, as well as a waiting fee.

Don’t be tempted to get in a taxi without these yellow registration plates – it’s an illegal taxi and can be expensive, or in the worst case scenario, dangerous.

Keep an eye on the company you’re travelling with

At Arlanda, there are different sections in the taxi queue for different companies. The first queue, closest to the exit, is for friåkarna, or the independent taxis. The second queue has small companies which are linked to a central ordering station, followed by Taxi Kurir, Sverigetaxi, Taxi Stockholm, with taxis to Uppsala and Västerås in the last queue. You don’t have to take the first taxi in the queue.

The taxi companies in this zone have an agreement with Swedavia, who run Arlanda Airport, which means that the maximum price for journeys in the marked zone below is regulated – 800 kronor for a standard-sized car for 1-4 people, or 1,275 kronor for a larger car.

The taxi zone at Arlanda – journeys within the dotted line shouldn’t cost more than 800 kronor for a small car. Photo: Swedavia

As you can see, there are many Stockholm suburbs which are not included in the taxi zone. So if you’re going to be travelling to a destination outside of the taxi zone area, you’ll be paying the meter rate – which is why it’s important to check the jämförpris before you get into the car.

Do the prices really vary that much?

Yes.

A number of taxi passengers have in recent months complained of extremely high prices when travelling to destinations just outside of the taxi zone area. Many of these passengers thought they were getting into a Taxi Stockholm cab (with a basic jämförpris of 349 kronor), only to realise upon arrival that they’d actually got into a cab run by a different operator with a much higher jämförpris.

“Some people come into our reception crying because they’ve paid five or six thousand kronor,” Taxi Stockholm’s CEO Pernilla Samuelsson told public broadcaster SVT.

According to Samuelsson, the company has had issues with so-called “copycabs” for a number of years. In 2022, Taxi Stockholm sued a copycat company which was using a name and logo which was almost identical to theirs and won. The company was forced to change its name and pay Taxi Stockholm six million kronor in damages.

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