Buying a house in Denmark: there is a cooling-off period — but it costs 1 per cent

Yes, as an EU citizen you buy a year-round home in Denmark (a home to live in all year) without a permit, once you actually live there. A holiday house only after five years.

Four things to know in advance:

• You pay no transfer tax, but you do pay a tinglysningsafgift: the duty for registering the deed. It is 1,850 kroner plus 0.6%.
• The find in Danish law is the cooling-off period: six working days after the purchase agreement. Withdrawing does cost 1% of the purchase price.
• The pitfall: a house you have bought may not stand empty. That is the bopælspligt: the home must be lived in.
• The lender advances at most eighty per cent, while you bring five per cent yourself.

In your first year you don't buy. You rent, and only then do you decide — why that order is fixed. In Denmark the law lends a hand: if you don't live there yet, you often aren't even allowed to buy.

May I buy in Denmark as a Dutch citizen?

Anyone without a residence (bopæl) in Denmark who has not previously lived there for at least five years needs permission from Civilstyrelsen to buy property.

For EU citizens there is a widening. A helårsbolig you may buy without that permission, with only a declaration to the Tinglysningsret (the Danish court that registers property). A helårsbolig is a home you will actually live in and register your address at. That widening does not cover sommerhuse: for those, the five-year requirement and the permission procedure apply in full.

May my Danish house stand empty?

In municipalities with housing regulation a helårsbolig carries a bopælspligt: the home must be lived in. If it stands empty for more than six weeks, you report that to the municipality. It may then assign a housing applicant, and you are obliged to rent to that applicant. The way back is shut too: a home that has been in year-round use within the past five years may not be taken into use as a summer house without the municipality's consent. So before you buy, ask what status the home has: helårsbolig or fritidsbolig.

Do I have a cooling-off period after the purchase agreement?

The purchase runs through a købsaftale, the purchase agreement, usually with your own boligadvokat (property lawyer) on your side. Then, as the buyer of a home, you have a statutory fortrydelsesret of six working days: the right to withdraw from the purchase. Whoever uses that right does pay the seller a godtgørelse of 1% of the purchase price, a compensation. That compensation only falls away when you buy from a seller acting professionally, such as the builder who put the house up in order to sell it. So treat the signature as final.

What do I give up if I skip the ejerskifteforsikring?

Before you make your offer, the seller can give you three things:

• a tilstandsrapport (a building survey);
• an elinstallationsrapport (an inspection of the electrical installation);
• an offer of an ejerskifteforsikring, the insurance against hidden defects.

If he does, afterwards you can no longer hold him to the building's physical condition or to installations that don't work. The condition is that he has committed in writing and bindingly to paying at least half the premium.

If you skip the insurance, you can still invoke defects that arose after the reports. A guarantee from the seller, fraud or gross negligence always stand.