Ugo51

Good!

Now I only have to learn Swedish, find a job in Stockholm, and buy a house. Easy no? ....

Ah! I so wish everything was easier...

lattmjolk

I have never rented out so I'm not sure how complicated it is. I know several people who do rent out.

It's only if you rent out more than one apartment that you have to comply fully with the law that regulates normal rental apartments. If you rent out just one apartment, you have less obligations towards the tenant.

It would be very expensive to have an apartment standing empty, doubling your housing costs, so I think this would be reserved for the very rich.

I would say those kinds of reasons would allow you to rent out your bostadsrätt for at least a year.

Yes. There is a lot of debate about harmonizing the construction legislation across the country, to introduce national legislation. Also, there are proposals to limit the right to appeal construction plans, both for private citizens and kommuner (municipality, county).

Good point, this is an advantage of ägarlägenheter.

In bostadsrättsföreningar (associations) that have less than a certain percentage of their income from its members, the bostadsrätter in that association may also be bought by "juridiska personer". This mostly occurs when the association rents out very attractive office or store spaces on ground level. It is then called an "oäkta bostadsrättsförening" (illegitimate association). The taxation disadvantages for individuals living in an "oäkta bostadsrätt" are so great that, in practice, there will only be corporate entities buying the apartments.

I think Swedes lean more towards practicality than ideology.


Get to it man!

Ugo51

Blackladder

Well, once again some self-appointed bunch of do-gooders, probably going under the names of The Association of Recreational and Sociological Education (A.R.S.E.) and The World Intellectual Property Executive (W.I.P.E.) have come up with World shattering news. You can just imagine the kinds of loaded questions that Went into that survey can't you?

Question 1
Where would you like to spend your holidays?
A Stockholm
B Death Valley
C Guantanamo Bay

Question 2 (for vegetarians only)
what is your favourite soup?
A Swede
B Stinkweed
C Pissenlit

Question 3
Where would you prefer to work?
A Gothenburg Tourist Office - PA to the Executive Director
B Ivory Coast Leper Colony - Assistant Chief Stumpwiper
C Louisiana Chapter of the Ku Klux Klan - Hood Pointer and Head Sharpener to the Grand Wizard (mind you, that's a Close one)

Blackie

Ugo51

Oh Blackie, I don't know what happened to you over there, but it's surely still fuelling your rage

I just hope you actually managed to get over it and that those 40 years are behind you

Blackladder

No, Ugo, not rage, I'm happy and contented now; I live in France! What I am concerned about is the way Lattmjolk and others blithely and smugly tell you that Life is easy in Sweden when the unemployment figures for Young people have reached 20 per cent, where no less than 40 per cent of all immigrant women are unemployed, where the average time taken for a foreigner to get a job in Sweden is between 7 and 9 YEARS, where old age pensioners still have to pay 30 per cent income tax on their pensions, which have already been taxed once, where the same pensioners cannot afford to heat their homes because of the price of heating oil (60 per cent of that is tax), where the still same pensioners cannot afford their medicinces or dental care, where, in the city where I once used to live, 1 per cent of the population is homeless, where the social Democrats have already announced both locally and nationally that taxes will have to rise after the next election, no Ugo, it's not rage, it's concern. I suppose after all the bottom line is Sweden is good for the Swedes (or most of them) and definitely not good for anyone else.
But thanks for the good wishes
Blackie

Ugo51

thank you for your concern Blackie.
I appreciate your contribution as much as I do with Lattmjolk's.

There are in fact some points of concern, specifically the time immigrants take to find a job, and the difficulties they find to build up a carreer.

What worries me the most is that I've never heard a Swede admitting there is any sort of difficulty for an immigrant to progress with his or her carrer. I can only assume they don't see it that way, which is very worrying...

Blackladder

Certainly in Denmark, Sweden and Norway, there is an undercurrent of racism and xenophobia. In some Towns, especially in Southern Sweden, local support for the Sweden Democrats (basically the same as the BNP) has reached 20 per cent of the voting population, figures Marine Le Pen and her Front Nationale here in France can only Dream of.
In Norway, Breivik's massacre of Young people was, according to his own testimony, in protest against the 'muslimification' of Norway, although he managed to kill mostly Young Norwegian Social Democrats. The fact that he was judged sane enough to be sentenced says a lot on its own.

Ugo51

20%?! That's a lot...

I'm developing a strongly dualistic vision of Sweden. On one side I see the wonderful landscapes, the nature, the beauty of Stockholm, the relaxed lifestyle.
On the other I see the difficulty of integration (not much social, but carreer-wise and financial) and a certain, oppressing requirement to be logom at all time, at all costs...

Gordon Barlow

This report/opinion is misleading. There are plenty of towns in France (and indeed in most European nations) where 20% of the voting population is strongly nationalistic or even xenophobic. Also, many voters are always on the look-out for political parties outside the mainstream to use as a vehicle for a protest vote. Some voters are merely anti-further-immigration, which is not the same as being anti-immigrant. A fair proportion of immigrants themselves are anti-further-immigration, in any country.

So I take this report/opinion with a large dose of salt.

edp

I tend to agree with Blackie. Its ok if you are a Swede because the disadvantages that you see as a foreigner besides the obvious problems of being in a foreign land are not seen by the native population. For sure Swedes are noticing a decline, although I don't know how much of that is the seemingly universal condition of 'the country's going to the dogs'. Ignorance is bliss. Most Swedes havent experienced life anywhere else and therefore it is perfectly normal that they would believe there own hype - masters of innovation, commanders of functionality, champions of social democracy, global bastions of the welfare state. As blackie intimates there seems to be quite alot of investment in perpetuating the myth of Sweden. Having lived in the UK and France, I wouldn't want to be sick in Sweden, everything takes 4 times long as it should, it has the worst distribution of wealth in Europe, everyone is trying to fleece you in very unsubtle ways at every step you take, everyone is obsessed with money and appearance. If you are in an exclusive club with a global press pointing your way every time they want to show how things should be done then its probably a great place to live. Its probably nice to feel that you are superior. I live in Sweden, I don't live in Swedish society. The doors are just not open.

Ugo51

ih ih, that was a nice Blackie-style post

Anyway, kidding aside, what exactly are you referring to when you say


and what are you comparing it to? UK and France?

I'm asking because I live in Scotland and I feel that quite a lot of things take 4 times longer than they would in Italy, so it would be quite interesting to see whether they are the same aspects we are talking about (i.e. 16x slower than in Italy. That ought to be a record )


And why you say you wouldn't like to be sick in Sweden? Assuming you weren't stating a general fact, as I know it's not nice to be sick in general
Is health system particularly poor or prohibitively expensive?

Annabel12

Good luck! I'm here for 4 months now and can barely say anything
I'm quite good with languages but this one is a nightmare!

Ugo51

Good to hear that

What do you find most difficult about Swedish language?

edp

Its not a hard language on paper, its often hard to understand what people are saying and make yourself understood. There are a lot of subtleties of pronunciation that make life hard. I don't know how many times I have said something, no-one understands what I am saying, someone finally gets it, repeats back how i should be saying it and i cannot hear any discernable difference and certainly in the context, i can't understand why it is not understandable. Its not as bad as Danish though! I have been here two years and I think i understand about 70% of the words of every written sentence - enough to understand what's going on for sure. In conversation that dips to around 30% - although logically they are the same words. Its hard with so much English spoken and having that to fall back on. Well lazy really. I can have reasonable conversations in Swedish with other immigrants but still find it hard with Swedes.

To answer your questions Ugo51, this is just my experience. Getting my qualifications checked is going on for 10 months now. Perssonnummer took a significant percentage of my lifespan. I think its a question of fastidious box checking. If they can't check the right boxes, you end up in the ether of a process. Anything they need from you - i.e money - is incredibly efficient, anything you need from them is incredibly slow.

In terms of health, as my friend says, you need to be healthy to be sick in Sweden. Not giving a sh*t is the term that comes to mind. Ive never ever thought that i would have to endure pain and live with it as i have in Sweden. I find that worrying that when i need help, you will struggle to get the help you need. I think having the open hours to Systembolaget is probably more useful.

When i think of Swedes in general, I think of the bully in the Simpsons. 'ha-ha'.