A Guide to Queue Points and Apartment Renting on HomeQ

(This article is also available in Swedish.)

How the HomeQ Queue Works

HomeQ – All landlords in one nationwide queue

More than 600 landlords are connected to HomeQ, offering hundreds of thousands of apartments across Sweden. The queue points you collect on HomeQ can be used to apply for apartments from any participating landlord, anywhere in the country.

HomeQ Samla – join and monitor external queues outside HomeQ

HomeQ Samla is a digital assistant for external housing queues. You can find and join hundreds of queues that are not yet available on HomeQ, and Samla logs in for you regularly so you don’t lose your place in line.

Together, HomeQ and HomeQ Samla give you an almost complete coverage of the Swedish rental market: 600+ HomeQ landlords in a national queue + more than 200 external queues via HomeQ Samla.

How do I collect queue points?

It’s simple: On HomeQ, one queue point equals one day in the queue. If you have 365 queue points, you’ve been a HomeQ user for one year.

With HomeQ Samla, you also collect one queue point per day and per individual queue you’ve chosen to join.

What are Bonus Points?

Bonus points are given to housing seekers who were already in a housing queue with a property company that decided to join HomeQ. One bonus point corresponds to one queue day in this case as well. Bonus points can only be used when applying for apartments from the property company where you previously earned queue points.

Example: When Riksbyggen joined HomeQ, the queue points people had accumulated in their own queue were transferred to HomeQ — but these can only be used when applying for Riksbyggen apartments on HomeQ.

Who decides who gets an apartment, and what are the requirements for applicants?

The roles of HomeQ and the landlord in the rental process

HomeQ

HomeQ is a platform for both applicants and property companies. For housing seekers, we provide a platform where you can efficiently and easily find apartments across the country.

HomeQ collects available apartments from hundreds of property companies in one single place. Instead of searching and registering on countless websites, you can find available apartments, submit interest applications, and respond to offers — all within the same interface, completely free, regardless of where in Sweden you want to live.

We have a queue you can join, free of charge. Some of our key tasks in the rental process include verifying the identity and employment status of all applicants. The system then automatically matches your profile with the landlord’s criteria when you submit an interest application for an apartment.

The landlord

For landlords, HomeQ is a platform where they can publish their apartments directly to potential tenants. We also provide tools that simplify their rental process — from listing and advertising to income verification and contract signing.

However, it is the landlord who ultimately decides who will receive a viewing invitation or rental contract, since they own and manage the apartments — not HomeQ.

How apartments are rented out on HomeQ

In most municipal and private housing queues, apartments are rented strictly based on queue points, often leading to painfully long waiting times. On HomeQ, there’s more flexibility — apartments can be rented out according to several different principles, not just "Strictly by queue points".

A landlord usually invites three to five applicants to a viewing, and all applicants are compared against the landlord’s criteria. Each landlord must always select a rental principle, which is stated in the listing, so you’ll always know what applies.

At the moment, there’s no function showing your exact position in the queue, but listings display the number of queue points currently required to be among the top 10 applicants by points.

Criteria

It’s worth noting that regardless of which rental principle a landlord uses, each landlord sets their own selection criteria that applicants must meet. All applicants are background-checked and matched against these criteria.

Each landlord defines their own requirements in our system — they are not set by HomeQ.

The most common criteria are:

• Income of at least three (3) times the monthly rent
• No payment defaults, debt balance, debt restructuring, or personal bankruptcy

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There are three rental principles applied by landlords on HomeQ

When property companies publish apartments on HomeQ, they choose one of three rental principles: Queue Points, First Come First Served, or Random Selection.

Queue Points

Traditional housing queues often operate Strictly by queue points, but HomeQ also offers an alternative principle related to queue time, Guided by queue points.

• Strictly by queue points

Here, applicants are first screened against the landlord’s criteria, and those who pass are ranked by queue points. When a landlord chooses the “Strictly by queue points” principle, the applicant with the highest number of points must be offered the apartment. If that person declines, the offer passes to the next in line.

• Guided by queue points

Here, applicants are also compared against the landlord’s criteria and ranked by queue points. The landlord’s view shows those with the most points first, giving them a better chance. However, under the “Guided by queue points” principle, the landlord is not obligated to offer the apartment to the top-ranked applicant — they may also consider factors like personal letter, family size, or financial situation to find the tenant they deem most suitable.

Application Date (First Come First Served)

Under the “First Come First Served” principle, applications are sorted by submission date. Queue points are not considered — the earlier you apply, the higher your chance. Landlords typically offer viewings to the applicants who registered interest first.

Random Selection (Lottery)

Under the “Lottery” principle, queue points and application order are disregarded entirely. Applications are ranked randomly, meaning that regardless of your queue points or when you apply, you still have a chance to be offered an apartment through a random draw.

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Frequently Asked Questions about the Queue System, Rental Principles, and Basic Criteria

What happens to my queue points when I get an apartment through HomeQ?

Once you’ve been offered an apartment and signed the contract, your HomeQ queue points will be reset to zero. This ensures that new applicants also have a fair chance to find housing — not only those who registered early on HomeQ.

The queue points you’ve earned in external housing queues via HomeQ Samla are not reset when you get an apartment through HomeQ. Likewise, your HomeQ queue points are not reset if you get an apartment through an external housing queue.

How common are the different rental principles?

During the third quarter (July–September 2025), nearly 22% of all apartments were rented out without queue time as a factor (via Lottery or First Come First Served). We regularly share statistics from the marketplace.