Room letting loses three-month ceiling; agents face identical-services rule

The three-month ceiling that defined "shorter time" for taxable room letting in hotel-like operations is goneSkatteverket. There is no longer any fixed time limitSkatteverket: With no fixed time limit, furnished accommodation is taxable rumsuthyrning i hotellrörelse eller liknande verksamhet or exempt property leasing based on an overall assessment of the business's actual content and how provision happensSkatteverket, under case law from Högsta förvaltningsdomstolen and the Court of Justice. Skatteverket's 10 March 2023 position statement on the subject is withdrawnSkatteverket. Taxable room letting and campsite provision carry 12 per cent VAT under 10 kap. 36 § first paragraph point 4 mervärdesskattelagen (2023:200)Skatteverket; other leasing of real property is exempt under 10 kap. 35 §, mirroring Articles 135.1(l) and 135.2(a) of the VAT Directive (2006/112/EC).

Taxability turns on active provisionSkatteverket: letting within a business aimed at supplying accommodation actively in a way that potentially competes with the hotel industrySkatteverket, assessed objectively from how the business is run rather than what the contract is called. Marketing at daily or weekly rates, purpose-adapted premises and hotel-typical services such as reception, cleaning during the stay and guest service point towards active provision. Both length of stay and surrounding circumstances such as contract design and ancillary services count: stays averaging six months have counted as lodging for a shorter timeSkatteverket, so four- or six-month lettings can be taxable where the circumstances show active useSkatteverket, while passive letting of furnished dwellings is exempt even when shortSkatteverket.

In HFD 2026 ref. 3 (mål 4731-25, 30 January 2026), furnished studio flats let for at most four or six months with no extension were taxable room lettingDomstol: weekly and check-out cleaning, bookable breakfast, lounge, gym and a reception staffed 18 to 24 hours showed active use potentially competing with hotelsSkatteverket. The contrast stands: four- to five-month lettings with extension options and only subordinate extras such as electricity, broadband and final cleaning remain passive and exempt (HFD 2019 ref. 46)Skatteverket. Assessment is per building and, for mixed use, per seasonSkatteverket: a hostel with 2-to-14-day stays stays taxable despite isolated longer stays, and rooms let to students in term time are passive while summer tourist letting with breakfast and hotel-typical service is taxable.

A second new rule concerns intermediaries: for a supply of services in one's own name on behalf of another, the service the intermediary buys must be identical to the service it sells (C-734/19, ITH, points 49 and 51)Skatteverket, creating the legal fiction of two identical consecutive suppliesSkatteverket. Where an intermediary acts in its own name, the whole amount the guest pays it is consideration for the letting service it suppliesSkatteverket. But where the owner's letting is passive while the next link is hotel-like room letting, there is no supply in one's own name on the owner's behalfSkatteverket, since two identical services are not supplied in sequence. In the rewritten mountain-cabin example the company's full-service letting is active and taxable at 12 per centSkatteverket while the private owner's letting to the company is passive and exemptSkatteverket; a site that only advertises and brings owner and guest together still acts in another's nameSkatteverket, with commission taxed at 25 per centSkatteverket.

Letting businesses and resale platforms should drop the three-month cut-off, test active provision per building and season, and verify bought and sold services are identical before treating an intermediary as supplier.

Legal basis: 10 kap. 2, 35 and 36 §§ mervärdesskattelagen (2023:200); Articles 28 and 135 of the VAT Directive (2006/112/EC); HFD 2026 ref. 3 (mål 4731-25); C-734/19, ITH.