Mortgage Crash Course – Step 8: Selling & Closing

Understand what happens to your mortgage when you sell

Paying Off at Sale

How It Works: The buyer's bank pays your remaining mortgage as part of the settlement. Your loan closes automatically.
Surplus: Sale price minus remaining loan, taxes, and fees is your equity ("Eget kapital"). This becomes your next down payment ("Kontantinsats").
Shortfall: If the sale doesn't cover the loan, you owe the difference ("Restskuld").
Timing: Settled on the access date ("Tillträdesdag"). Have your new financing in place if buying simultaneously.

What's Taxed: Sale price minus purchase price ("Inköpspris"), minus improvements ("Förbättringsutgifter"), minus selling costs ("Försäljningskostnader").
Tax Rate: 22% of the profit ("Vinst"). On a 1 million SEK gain, you pay 220,000 SEK.
Deductible Improvements ("Förbättringsutgifter"): Renovations exceeding 5,000 SEK per year can be deducted. Keep receipts.
Selling Costs: Broker commission ("Mäklararvode") and styling costs ("Stylingkostnader") are deductible from the gain.

What It Is: Defer capital gains tax ("Reavinstskatt") by buying a new primary residence ("Permanentbostad"). The tax debt follows you to the new property.
Requirements: Must buy a replacement primary residence. New property must cost at least as much as the sale price of the old one to defer the full gain.
No Annual Cost: As of January 1st 2021, there is no annual cost for holding a deferral ("Uppskov"). Previously, a notional income ("Schablonintäkt") of 1.67% was taxed annually (effective cost ~0.5% per year), but this was abolished (SFS 2020:1068). Deferral is now completely free.
When You Pay: Due when you eventually sell without replacement, or move abroad. Can be deferred indefinitely through successive purchases.
Cap: There's a cap of 3,000,000 SEK on the deferral amount ("Uppskovsbelopp") per property, and the minimum is 50,000 SEK.

After Payoff: Mortgage deeds ("Pantbrev") remain registered on the property even after the mortgage is paid off.
Transfer to Buyer: Existing mortgage deeds can transfer to the buyer's bank, saving them from creating new ones.
Digital Mortgage Deeds ("Datapantbrev"): Most are electronic today, managed by the land registry ("Lantmäteriet"). No physical documents to track.
No Need to Release: Rarely any reason to formally release ("Döda") them. They have value for the next owner.

Step 8 of 8