Food

The prices of food in the Swedish Consumer Agency’s yearly prognosis vary depending on the age of each person and whether they eat lunch at home on weekdays or not.

For an adult aged between 18-30 who eats three meals a day at home, with two snacks between meals, the agency predicts a monthly food cost of 3,940 kronor, or 3,710 kronor for someone aged 31-60.

Babies aged six months to a year have a monthly food cost of 1,090 kronor, according to the agency’s calculations, rising to 1,220 kronor for a one year old eating all lunches at home. 

A one year old who eats lunch at preschool five days a week is predicted to have a monthly food cost of 910 kronor next year, rising to 1,260 kronor for 2-5 year olds.

A child aged 6-9 who eats five lunches a week at school would have a monthly food cost of 1,850 kronor, rising to 2,320 kronor for a 10-13 year old and 2,800 kronor for a 14-17 year old.

All these categories are based on the Nordic dietary guidelines, which recommend little red meat and high amounts of whole grains, vegetables and fish.

This means that a family of two adults aged over 31 and two children aged 6-9, where the adults take their own lunches to work, can expect a monthly food cost of 11,120 kronor in 2024. That might sound high, but it’s only eight percent higher than the agency’s food costs for 2023, so the real number for some households may be much lower.

Other individual costs

On top of those costs, there are additional individual costs for each age group, giving a total of between 2,000 and 2,860 kronor on top of food costs for things like clothing, leisure activities, a mobile phone (not including the contract) and personal hygiene.

See the table below for a breakdown of these costs.

Shared household costs

Finally, there are shared household costs for households ranging from one to seven people. These include consumer goods, home goods, media, electricity, water and drainage, and home insurance, which varies in price depending on whether the household is in a large city, medium-sized city or a smaller town.

Single-person households in a major town can expect to pay 3,670 kronor per month on these expenses, rising to 4,340 kronor for two people or 6,460 kronor for a family of four.

Is this more or less expensive than in 2023?

It’s likely next year that people living in Sweden will still be facing high interest rates and high rents. When looking at the bigger picture, though, it’s not all bad news.

According to the agency’s forecast, Swedish energy bills will be 30 percent lower than this year, meaning we’re unlikely to see electricity prices anywhere near the levels seen at the end of 2022 or in 2023, unless there’s an extremely cold winter or an unforeseen event affects the energy market.

Water and drainage costs for homeowners are expected to rise by around 15 percent next year, which will also indirectly affect owners of apartments in housing associations (BRFs), as this may have a knock-on effect on association fees.

Food prices, which have risen 26 percent over the past two years, are expected to go up by eight percent in 2024.

Finally, prices for shoes and clothing are expected to rise by 30 percent, although the agency says that is due more to the fact that the items included in the “basic wardrobe” used for the calculation have changed, rather than the fact that prices have shot up.

How is this data used?

The Consumer Agency’s figures, which don’t include housing costs, are calculated each year and supplied to government agencies, where they are used by municipalities and the Social Insurance Agency when figuring out the size of benefits, like subsistence allowance.

They’re also used by banks in their kvar att leva på (“left to live off”) calculation, which they look at when deciding whether to approve a mortgage or not.

Essentially, the bank will look at a prospective homeowner’s income, subtract costs of housing (mortgage, interest rates a few points higher than the current rate, in case it rises in the future, and any fee paid to a housing association or running costs for a home), and then see if the amount left over is enough to cover the cost of living according to the Consumer Agency’s figures.

The figures are also useful for anyone living in Sweden or planning to move to Sweden who wants a guideline when setting their own household budget.