ROT-avdrag: what you get back on a home repair in Sweden (2026)

In 2026, ROT-avdrag cuts 30% off the labour cost of a home repair, not 30% off the whole job. It is figured on labour including VAT, capped at SEK 50,000 per person a year, and works only if you own the home and the contractor has F-skatt. The rate reverted from a temporary 50% on 1 January 2026. What it never touches is the rest of the bill: materials, parts, and call-out fees carry no reduction. Source: Skatteverket, Så fungerar rotavdraget

ROT touches the labour, and only the labour

The single thing that decides your deduction is how the invoice splits labour from everything else. On a job that is mostly parts and little labour, the deduction is small even when the total bill is large; on a labour-heavy job it is the reverse.

For a bundled contract where labour and materials come as one price, Skatteverket can set a standard labour share (a schablon). For heat pumps the share is fixed: 35% of the contract for a ground-source job, 30% for an air heat pump. The contractor applies that share, takes 30% of the labour figure, and the rest of the contract carries no deduction. This is why two jobs at the same price can return very different amounts: the one with more labour in it returns more.

The practical move is to make the split visible before you agree to anything. A quote that states the labour cost on its own line tells you your ROT in advance; a single lump sum hides it.

The 2026 number, and why it keeps moving

The rate in 2026 is 30% of the labour cost including VAT, and it changed twice in under a year. It was 30%, rose to a temporary 50% for work paid for between 12 May and 31 December 2025 to support the construction trade, and reverted to 30% on 1 January 2026 when that measure was not extended.

Which rate you get is set by the date you pay, not the invoice date and not the date the work was done. A job you paid for in December 2025 sits in the 2025 rules; the same job paid for in January 2026 sits at 30%. If you are reading this in a later year, check the current rate against Skatteverket before you budget: this is the one figure in the scheme that moves with the autumn budget, and a number that was right last year may not be right now.

The ceiling is 50,000, sitting inside a shared 75,000

ROT is capped at SEK 50,000 per person per year, but that cap lives inside a combined ROT-and-RUT ceiling of SEK 75,000 per person per year. The two are not independent: if you claim the full SEK 50,000 of ROT, you have SEK 25,000 of room left for RUT (cleaning, gardening, and other household services), not a fresh SEK 75,000. RUT spending and ROT spending draw down the same envelope.

The per-person structure is the part worth planning around. Two people who both own the home each have their own SEK 50,000 ROT ceiling, so a couple can claim up to SEK 100,000 of ROT on one property in a year when the invoice is split between them and both meet the conditions. Separate temporary ceilings (SEK 75,000 each for ROT and RUT) existed for the 2024 tax year only and have lapsed.

Who qualifies, and the trap that catches new builds

You qualify if you own the home and live in it, or a parent does, and you are taxed in Sweden. The work must be done by a company approved for F-skatt, and you must pay electronically; a cash arrangement cannot carry the deduction, which is why the cash price that looks cheaper on the quote is usually dearer after ROT. The contractor applies the deduction on the invoice and reclaims it from Skatteverket, so you pay the reduced figure directly rather than waiting for a refund.

The trap is the five-year rule. You cannot claim ROT for building a new home, and you cannot claim it for renovation or extension work during the first five years after the year the house was finished (its värdeår). If your house is newer than that, the work does not qualify yet, however ordinary the repair looks.

Heat pumps, boilers, and stoves are ROT, not grön teknik

Installing, repairing, or replacing a heat pump, a boiler, or a wood stove is approved ROT work. This catches people out because heat pumps feel like green technology, but the grön teknik deduction is a separate scheme that covers only three things: solar panels at 15%, home batteries at 50%, and EV charging points at 50%. Heat pumps are not on that list, and you cannot claim ROT and grön teknik for the same work.

For a heat pump the location rule decides how much qualifies. In a detached house (småhus), ROT covers work inside the home and on the plot in close connection to it; for a ground-source system the drilling itself sits outside that, which is part of why the labour schablon is set where it is. In a flat (bostadsrätt), only work inside the dwelling counts, and the schablon shortcut is not available there.

This is the kind of distinction a maintenance record is built to hold: which component was installed when, what the contract split was, and how much ROT you have already used this year against the SEK 50,000 ceiling. appkeep keeps that against each component so the deduction is a number you already know rather than one you reconstruct at invoice time.

Worked example: Elin’s ground-source heat pump

Elin in Linköping is having a ground-source heat pump installed. The contractor quotes a single contract price of SEK 120,000, covering the pump, the borehole, and the installation.

Because labour and materials are bundled, Skatteverket’s schablon for a ground-source pump sets the labour share at 35%: SEK 120,000 × 0.35 = SEK 42,000 of qualifying labour. ROT is 30% of that: SEK 42,000 × 0.30 = SEK 12,600. The contractor deducts the SEK 12,600 on the invoice and reclaims it from Skatteverket, so Elin pays SEK 107,400 rather than SEK 120,000, and she has used SEK 12,600 of her SEK 50,000 ROT ceiling for the year. [Source: Skatteverket worked example, Så fungerar rotavdraget]

The number that does not appear on the invoice is the one that matters most over time: the borehole she paid to drill will outlast the pump by decades, so when this pump reaches the end of its life she replaces the unit and reuses the hole. The expensive civil work is a one-time cost; the pump is the part on a replacement cycle.

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Related guides

• What a plumber should cost in Sweden: how ROT applies to a plumber’s labour, with metro and regional rates.
• Repair or replace: the maths that decides: where the ROT-reduced labour cost fits into the annual-cost comparison.
• What a boiler replacement costs: the heating-system decision this deduction sits underneath.
• How to read a contractor quote: why the labour line has to be itemised for ROT to work.

Glossary terms used in this guide

• Glossary: Mandate: the budget ceiling you set before the work, with the labour line stated.
• Glossary: Corrective maintenance: the kind of work ROT most often pays toward.