Skåne County

Skåne is the southern tip of Sweden, flat farming country that gives way to forest and lakes in the north and meets the sea to the west and south. Just over 1.4 million people live here in 33 municipalities, and the county is growing faster than most. Skåne is also one of the country's younger counties. With Copenhagen a train ride away across the bridge, everyday life is closer to a big city than you might expect from a county with so much farmland. But Skåne is not one single place. It is at least three.

The ring around Malmö and Lund

The heart is the belt between Malmö, Lund and the Öresund strait. Malmö is Sweden's third city, young and dense, with sea baths, parks and a range of things to do that rarely forces anyone to leave the municipality. Lund is the student town where the bike comes first, with the new district of Brunnshög under construction. Housing is expensive and small flats are the hardest to find, so many of those who work here live somewhere else.

That is why the surrounding municipalities have become the county's prosperous commuter towns. Lomma has the highest median incomes in the county and Vellinge is not far behind, with unemployment below three per cent. Staffanstorp, Kävlinge and Svedala follow the same pattern: detached and terraced houses, good schools, cycle paths and a train or bus into the city. The price is that things get sleepy. Kävlinge is ten minutes from Lund but has a quiet centre in the evenings, and in Staffanstorp you go to the neighbouring cities for most things beyond the everyday. Burlöv, squeezed between Malmö and Lund, is more of a shopping hub, with big differences between prosperous residential streets and tougher areas.

The coast, the plain and Österlen

On the Öresund lies Helsingborg, the port city with the ferry to Helsingør, a large restaurant and cultural scene and Kullaberg within reach. North of it are Höganäs, Ängelholm and Båstad, where the Hallandsåsen ridge meets the sea. Ängelholm has trains to Helsingborg, Malmö and Gothenburg, while Båstad lives two lives: a summer life with tennis and expensive houses, and a fairly dead winter. To the south lie Trelleborg as a port town, Ystad with its medieval core and Österlen with Simrishamn, where the beaches, the villages and the artists draw half of Sweden in July. Simrishamn has the oldest population in the county, over fifty on average, while Malmö has the lowest.

Kristianstad is the big town of north-eastern Skåne, a comfortable size and with Åhus and the sea within reach. Hässleholm is the railway hub, more a place to pass through than a destination, but the small towns around it have cheap houses and a strong sense of community.

The north and east carry the downside

The differences between the municipalities are large. Median income is just under SEK 300,000 in Perstorp, while Lomma is above SEK 460,000. Perstorp also has the highest unemployment in the county and Vellinge the lowest. The same northern and eastern belt, with Östra Göinge, Osby, Bromölla, Örkelljunga and Perstorp, has low incomes, and in Östra Göinge, Bromölla and Perstorp unemployment is high and young adults struggle to get into the job market. Östra Göinge has lost more inhabitants than any other municipality in the county since 2021, and Perstorp and Osby are shrinking too. Skurup is growing fastest, closely followed by Staffanstorp and Malmö.

Distances are part of everyday life: a car is often a must, the trains do not go everywhere, and for jobs and shopping people look to Kristianstad, Helsingborg or Malmö. Osby has two stations and Tomelilla three, so it is possible to live without a car, but that is the exception.

The county as a whole has one of the highest unemployment levels in the country, the second highest of all counties, and incomes are somewhat below the national average even though education levels are higher. Much of that comes down to Malmö, where the highly educated and the poor live side by side, and to the industrial municipalities in the north. Areas on the police list of vulnerable areas are found in Malmö, Helsingborg, Landskrona and Kristianstad. Landskrona has a divided reputation, with the national news darker than everyday life, and segregation is part of the picture in Helsingborg too.

Anyone who wants big-city life, the sea and Copenhagen will settle in well in Malmö, Lund or the surrounding municipalities, if the budget stretches. Anyone looking for a cheap house and some peace will find it in Eslöv, Höör or Sjöbo, as long as the commute works. And anyone who wants to live far from everything and is prepared for distances and a tough job market will find that up in the north.