Your car to Sweden: cheap, with three bits of small print

If you've read the Denmark chapter of this knowledge base, you expect the worst. Relax: Sweden is the opposite. There is no registration tax on import, the administration is two steps, and on export the Netherlands refunds the remaining BPM. For almost every used car, taking it along is the right sum here.

The procedure: two steps

First the ursprungskontroll at Transportstyrelsen: the origin check of the vehicle, applied for online with your original registration certificate and the purchase document — SEK 1,240 (2026). After approval follows the registreringsbesiktning at an inspection station; if it passes, the company registers the car in the register straight away, the registration number is assigned automatically and the plates land on the doormat within a week. The inspection itself is a market price set by the inspection company — count on a few thousand kronor, and feel free to compare.

After that you only pay the ordinary fordonsskatt: a base amount of SEK 360 plus a CO₂ component. No import levy, no percentage of the value, nothing.

The three bits of small print

One: the seven days. On your Dutch plates you may drive only seven days after import. If the registration process takes longer — and it almost always does — apply for the tillfällig registrering: a temporary Swedish registration of at most three months, with which you may simply keep driving on your valid EU papers until the final registration is complete. Arrange it right away; it cannot be extended.

Two: the VAT trap for young cars. A car that on arrival is younger than six months or has driven fewer than 6,000 kilometres counts for VAT as a new means of transport — and then Sweden charges 25% VAT, to be declared within 35 days. So if you've just bought a new car, you'd better wait until it's past those limits, or honestly count the VAT in.

Three: the malus counts from the first registration — anywhere in the world. Sweden levies an increased road tax on new petrol and diesel cars for three years. The misunderstanding online is that those three years start again at the Swedish registration; the rule says explicitly that the clock runs from the first entry into service "in Sweden or in another country". So a Dutch car older than three years never pays malus, and a younger one only the remainder of the term.

The Dutch side: the refund and its clock

Register the car with the RDW for export and apply for the BPM refund. The condition to remember: the Swedish registration must be complete within thirteen weeks of the RDW export status, demonstrable with documents. Thirteen weeks sounds ample, but the ursprungskontroll has no published processing time — so start the Swedish process in your first week, not once the boxes are unpacked.

The sum in one paragraph

Add up: SEK 1,240 origin check, an inspection of a few thousand kronor, possibly the malus remainder for a young car. Subtract: the remaining BPM the Netherlands refunds — for most cars hundreds to thousands of euros. For almost every used family car the outcome is positive, and unlike in Denmark you therefore don't have to say goodbye to a perfectly good car here. Only whoever drives something very young or very economical does the sum a bit more consciously.