Buying Property in Turkey: Conditions, Limits and Checks

Foreign individuals may buy property in Turkey if they are nationals of countries determined by the President and the acquisition stays within the statutory limits (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/1). Reciprocity is not among the conditions the Article now sets. The assessment that decides a purchase covers four further things: the area limits, whether the parcel lies in a military or security zone, the project obligation that attaches to undeveloped land, and the rights other people already hold over the property.

The Turkish titles of the statutes are given here because the official texts are published under them, and a land registry directorate, a notary or a court will look for the Turkish name rather than a translation.

1. Buying Property in Turkey: Who May Acquire and on What Condition

Buying property in Turkey as a foreign individual turns on one gateway condition. Foreign real persons who are nationals of countries determined by the President, in light of international bilateral relations and where the country’s interests so require, may acquire immovable property and limited rights in rem in Turkey, subject to compliance with statutory limits (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/1).

Two things follow from that sentence. Acquisition is not open to every foreigner automatically: the nationality has to fall inside the framework. And the framework is defined by decision of the President rather than by the buyer’s own circumstances, so it is a question about a list, not about the individual.

1.1. Buying Property in Turkey Without Reciprocity: What Replaced It

The Article was re-enacted in full by Law No. 6302, and its current wording carries the amendment note itself. The test the wording sets is nationality of a country determined by the President. Whether the buyer’s own country allows Turkish nationals to acquire there is not one of the conditions the Article states.

This matters because the older condition is still repeated in circulation. The practical question is not does my country sell property to Turkish nationals; it is whether the nationality falls within the framework in force on the day of the transaction. Guidance written against the earlier text is describing a condition the present text does not contain.

2. Buying Property in Turkey: the Area Limits on an Acquisition

Buying property in Turkey is capped in amount as well as gated by nationality, and the two conditions sit in the same paragraph. The total area of immovable property and of independent and permanent limited rights in rem acquired by foreign real persons may not exceed ten percent of the privately owned area of the district, nor thirty hectares per person nationwide. The President is empowered to increase the amount that may be acquired per person nationwide up to twofold (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/1).

2.1. Buying Property in Turkey: Which Area Limit You Can Check Yourself

The two caps behave differently, and the difference decides who has to answer the question.

The thirty-hectare cap is personal. It measures what one buyer holds across the whole country, and the buyer knows their own holdings. It is also the figure the President may double, so the number that applies is the one in force on the day.

The ten-percent cap is not personal at all. It is a ceiling on the district, measured against the privately owned area of that district, and whether it has been reached depends on what every other foreign buyer there has already acquired. No buyer can compute it from their own file. The land registry is the body that knows, which is why this limit is answered through the enquiry described below rather than by the buyer’s own arithmetic.

3. Buying Property in Turkey When the Eligible-Country Framework Changes

The framework is expressly changeable, and the Law says so in terms. Where the country’s interests so require, the President may determine, restrict, partly or wholly suspend, or prohibit acquisitions of immovable property and limited rights in rem by foreign real persons and by commercial companies established abroad under the laws of their own countries, doing so by country, person, geographical region, term, number, ratio, type, quality, area and amount (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/3).

That is the provision that makes a check on the day of the transaction necessary rather than merely prudent. Eligibility, ratios and even a complete suspension can be altered by presidential decision. A country list that was accurate when it was written is not evidence of what applies on the day of the transfer, and this article is no exception to that.

4. Buying Property in Turkey in a Military or Security Zone

This is the condition that most often defeats a purchase after the price has been agreed, and it has a different legal source from everything above. Eligibility and area limits come from the Land Registry Law; the zone question comes from the Law on Military Prohibited Zones and Security Zones.

4.1. The Bar on Foreign Persons in a Second-Degree Land Military Prohibited Zone

In second-degree land military prohibited zones, foreign real and legal persons may not acquire immovable property, and the President is empowered to decide on the liquidation of immovable property in the zone belonging to foreigners and to determine the form and conditions of that liquidation (2565 sayılı Askeri Yasak Bölgeler ve Güvenlik Bölgeleri Kanunu m.9/b). For the foreign individual this is not a permission requirement that can be satisfied. It is a bar, and it reaches legal persons as well.

The same Article closes a second door that buyers rarely think about. In that zone foreigners may not, even temporarily, enter, reside, work or rent immovable property without permission (m.9/c). Someone who concludes that the zone question does not concern them because they intend to rent rather than buy has read only half of the provision.

4.2. Areas Determined on Strategic Grounds

The reach is not limited to land already designated as military. The President may decide that, in areas to be determined by reason of proximity to military prohibited zones or on other strategic grounds, foreigners may not acquire immovable property and may not lease it without permission (m.28). So an area with no military character visible on the ground can still carry the restriction.

4.3. How the Zone Question Reaches the Land Registry

The zone question is not left to the buyer’s research. Maps and coordinate values of military prohibited zones, military security zones and strategic areas are supplied by the Ministry of National Defence, and those of special security zones by the Ministry of the Interior, to the Ministry to which the General Directorate of Land Registry and Cadastre is attached; land registry transactions are then carried out according to the documents and information sent under that paragraph (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/5).

That is the mechanism by which a zone restriction becomes visible at the counter rather than in the field. It also explains why the answer comes from the land registry channel and not from a map the buyer consults.

5. Buying Property in Turkey Through a Company: Two Separate Regimes

Companies are not a single category here. A company formed abroad and a company formed in Turkey with foreign capital are governed by different provisions, with different limits and different permission authorities. Choosing the vehicle is a legal question before it is a commercial one.

5.1. Buying Property in Turkey Through a Company Formed Abroad

Commercial companies with legal personality established abroad under the laws of their own countries may acquire immovable property and limited rights in rem only within the framework of special law provisions. Entities other than those commercial companies may not acquire immovable property, and no limited right in rem may be established in their favour (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/2).

Two consequences are worth separating. The permission is narrow: it reaches commercial companies, and only through special law provisions. And the exclusion is broad: the provision’s own phrase covers everything that is not one of those commercial companies, without listing categories.

The same paragraph then carves out financing entirely. The limits in the Article do not apply to the establishment of a mortgage over immovable property in favour of those commercial companies or of foreign real persons (m.35/2). A foreigner who may not acquire a given parcel may still take security over it, which is why lending structures and ownership structures are analysed separately.

5.2. Buying Property in Turkey Through a Turkey-Established Company

A company established in Turkey is a different case. Companies with legal personality established in Turkey in which foreign real persons, legal persons established under the laws of foreign countries or international organisations hold fifty percent or more of the shares, or have the power to appoint or dismiss the majority of those holding management rights, may acquire and use ownership of immovable property or limited rights in rem in order to carry out the activities stated in their articles of association (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.36/1). Persons within the scope of the Blue Card provision of the Turkish Citizenship Law are expressly excluded from that fifty-percent test.

The limiting factor here is not an area cap. It is the company’s stated purpose: the acquisition has to serve the activity clauses in the articles of association, and use of the property is monitored by the governorships against the land registry records (m.36/6). The same fifty-percent logic is applied where such a company becomes a shareholder in another Turkey-established company, and where foreign investors reach fifty percent in a company that already owns immovable property through a share transfer (m.36/2).

In military and security zones these companies are not barred outright. Their acquisitions in military prohibited zones, military security zones and areas determined under 2565 sayılı Kanun m.28 are subject to the permission of the General Staff or of the commands it authorises, and acquisitions in special security zones to the permission of the governorship of the place where the property is located, with the suitability of the acquisition for national security taken as the basis (m.36/3).

The two zone rules are therefore not the same rule applied to two buyers. For the foreign individual the answer is a bar under the Law on Military Prohibited Zones; for the Turkey-established foreign-capital company it is a permission, with a named authority that differs according to the type of zone. The territories the two provisions describe are also drawn differently, which is another reason the parcel has to be run through the land registry channel rather than assessed from a map.

Article 36 also lists situations it does not govern at all: the creation of a mortgage, acquisitions arising from the enforcement of a mortgage, transfers of ownership arising from mergers and demergers, acquisitions in organised industrial zones, industry zones, technology development zones and free zones, and property banks take on in connection with credit transactions or to collect their receivables while a disposal obligation continues (m.36/5). Companies falling outside the paragraphs above acquire on the same terms as domestic-capital companies (m.36/4).

Where the vehicle is to be a Turkish company, its formation and the activity clauses in its articles of association are covered in setting up a company in Turkey as a foreigner.

6. Buying Land in Turkey: the Two-Year Project Obligation

Buying property in Turkey that has no building on it brings an obligation buyers routinely discover late. Foreign real persons and commercial companies with legal personality established abroad under the laws of their own countries must submit the project they will develop on the undeveloped immovable they have purchased to the approval of the relevant Ministry within two years. The project approved by the Ministry, with commencement and completion periods determined, is sent to the land registry directorate where the immovable is located to be recorded in the declarations section of the land register, and whether the approved project is realised within its period is monitored by the Ministry (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/4).

Three dates are doing work in that paragraph: two years to submit, the commencement and completion periods the Ministry sets, and the monitoring that follows. Missing any of them is one of the triggers of the liquidation regime described near the end of this article, so the obligation is not administrative housekeeping.

7. Buying Agricultural Land in Turkey: Farmland Under Two Laws at Once

Buying agricultural land in Turkey is open to a foreign buyer on the same terms as any other immovable: nationality of a country determined by the President and the two area caps, ten percent of the district’s privately owned area and thirty hectares per person nationwide (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/1). The Land Registry Law has no separate farmland regime for foreigners. What changes with farmland is that a second statute, the soil-protection law, governs the land itself whoever buys it, and the thirty-hectare cap becomes a real limit rather than a theoretical one.

7.1. Buying Agricultural Land in Turkey: the Old Village Bar Is Repealed

The provision of the Village Law that is still quoted as barring foreigners from acquiring land and property in villages is no longer in force; it was repealed by Law No. 4916 of 3 July 2003 (442 sayılı Köy Kanunu m.87, mülga). A farmland purchase in a village is therefore assessed under the current Article 35 of the Land Registry Law, not under the Village Law.

7.2. Turkey Farmland Cannot Be Divided Below the Adequate-Income Size

Turkey farmland is subject to a minimum size that no buyer can go below. The adequate-income agricultural land sizes of provinces and districts are set in list (1) annexed to the soil-protection law, and agricultural land may not be parcelled out or divided below those sizes; the Ministry notifies the land registry of this attribute so that it is annotated (5403 sayılı Toprak Koruma ve Arazi Kullanımı Kanunu m.8/A). A plan to buy part of a field and register it as a separate parcel has to be checked against that list first.

7.3. Buying a Share of Agricultural Land in Turkey Needs Ministry Permission

Buying a share of agricultural land in Turkey is not a private matter between buyer and seller. On agricultural land, parcelling out, dividing into shares, assignment of a share, conversion of joint ownership into shared ownership, transfer of joint ownership, passing on as shared ownership, partition and change of qualification are carried out with the permission of the Ministry (5403 sayılı Toprak Koruma ve Arazi Kullanımı Kanunu m.8/B). The fractional title that is common in rural land (hisseli tarla) is exactly the case the provision reaches: a foreign buyer acquiring a share is taking an assignment of a share, and the transaction depends on that permission.

7.4. Buying Agricultural Land in Turkey and the Two-Year Project Obligation

Buying agricultural land in Turkey without a building on it brings the project obligation in the section above into play. The Article attaches it to the unbuilt immovable (yapısız taşınmaz) a foreign real person purchases and draws no exception for land that will stay in agricultural use (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/4). A buyer who intends to farm rather than build should plan for the two-year submission from the start rather than assume that farming takes the land outside the obligation, because failure to carry out the approved project is one of the triggers of the liquidation regime.

8. Buying Property in Turkey: the Two Questions Before the Title Deed

Two separate questions have to be answered before the transfer, and they are often merged into one. They have different sources, different answers and different consequences.

The first is whether this buyer may acquire: the nationality within the eligible-country framework, and the area limits, both of which sit in the first paragraph of the Article (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/1). The ten-percent district ceiling is the part the buyer cannot compute, so this question is answered through the land registry channel.

The second is whether this parcel may be acquired by a foreigner: the zone status, which comes from the Law on Military Prohibited Zones and Security Zones and reaches the counter through the maps and coordinates supplied under m.35/5. For the individual the outcome is a bar (2565 sayılı Kanun m.9/b); for a Turkey-established foreign-capital company it is a permission from a named authority (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.36/3).

Note what neither question covers. Both are about whether the acquisition is permitted. Neither says anything about the condition of the property, who else holds rights over it, or whether the seller is free to sell. Those are separate enquiries, and the sections that follow are about them.

9. Reading the Title Deed Before Buying Property in Turkey: Three Columns

The land register is not one list. It has three columns with three different legal effects, and calling all of them şerh in conversation is the single most common source of confusion.

9.1. Registration: Where Rights in Rem Are Created

Ownership, easements and land charges, and rights of pledge are registered in the land register (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.1008). Registration is what creates these rights. A mortgage over the property being bought is therefore not a note in the file; it is a right in rem attached to the property, and it does not disappear because the owner changes.

9.2. Annotation: Where a Personal Right Is Made Effective Against Others

Rights arising from construction-in-return-for-land-share, sale-promise, lease, purchase, pre-emption and repurchase contracts, together with other rights that statutes expressly allow to be annotated, may be annotated on the land register; once annotated, they may be asserted against the holders of rights subsequently acquired over that immovable (m.1009).

The effect for a buyer is direct. A sale-promise annotation in favour of someone else means that person’s personal claim can be raised against the new owner. Nor does the column clear itself quietly: where no sale takes place, or no easement is established and registered, within five years of the annotation, the annotation is struck off ex officio by the land registry director or officials (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.26). What matters for the purchase is the state of the register on the day, because an annotation that is still showing is still an annotation.

9.3. Declarations: Appurtenances and Public-Law Restrictions

The appurtenances of an immovable are entered in the declarations column upon the owner’s request, and cancellation of that entry depends on the consent of all interested parties appearing as rights holders in the register (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.1012). This is also the column in which the approved project for undeveloped land is recorded (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/4), which is why a declarations entry can be the first visible sign that a parcel carries a development obligation.

10. Buying Property in Turkey: How to Carry Out a Title Search

Buying property in Turkey requires examining the relevant land register page and its supporting documents. The Civil Code declares the register open, but access to the relevant page and documents depends on making one’s interest credible to the registry officer. The provision allows inspection or copies; it does not establish an unrestricted online owner-name search for anyone considering a purchase (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.1020).

Before requesting the record, obtain the property’s province, district, neighbourhood, block and parcel identifiers and, for an apartment, the independent unit details. Keep the documents showing the proposed transaction and identify the record you need to examine. A photograph of the seller’s title deed can help identify that record; arrange an examination of the current entries before relying on it for the transfer decision (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.1020).

TKGM’s Parsel Sorgulama guidance describes the public service for checking location and basic parcel information. It also states that the service does not support searching by an owner’s name or Turkish identity number. Use the parcel information to identify the land concerned, then request the relevant register information through the appropriate access route. A map search does not answer the separate questions about registered rights described above.

For the title search itself, work through the record in this order:

1. Match the property and ownership entry to the proposed sale. Check whether the transaction concerns the identified independent unit or an ownership share in the parcel. Ownership and other rights in rem are recorded in the register (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.1008).
2. Examine registered security rights. A mortgage does not ordinarily cease to secure the debt merely because the immovable is transferred. If removal is part of the purchase agreement, establish how the relevant entry will be dealt with rather than assuming payment to the seller clears it (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.888).
3. Read the annotations and the underlying documents needed to understand them. The personal rights listed in Article 1009 can be asserted against holders of rights acquired subsequently once annotated; an existing sale-promise annotation needs examination alongside the proposed transfer (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.1009, m.1020).
4. Examine the declarations separately and refer each relevant entry to its own legal basis. The column’s contents are not all mortgages or sale prohibitions; the appurtenance rule and other statutory declaration requirements have their own effects (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.1012).

Good-faith reliance on a registered entry has statutory protection, but a person who knows or ought to know that registration is unlawful cannot rely on it. The search should therefore address an unexplained discrepancy between the proposed seller, the registered owner and the supporting documents, rather than treating possession of a deed as conclusive (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.1023, m.1024).

If the seller acquired the property through succession and the supporting inheritance documents need examination, the certificate of inheritance in Turkey guide explains that document’s separate function. Foreign-buyer eligibility, registered rights, inheritance documents and the building’s legal condition remain distinct checks; completing the title search does not complete all of them.

11. Buying Property in Turkey from a Married Seller: the Family Home Consent

This is the restriction least likely to be visible on the register. Neither spouse may terminate the lease relating to the family home, transfer the family home, or limit the rights over the family home, without the other spouse’s express consent (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.194).

Two features of the Article decide how it is handled in practice. The consent must be express, and the Article does not lay down a form for it. And the annotation is dealt with in a separate sentence: the spouse who is not the owner of the immovable allocated as the family home may request the land registry directorate to place the relevant annotation. The consent requirement is stated as the condition of the transaction itself; the annotation is something the non-owner spouse may ask for.

Against this sits the register’s own protection: a third party who acquires ownership or another right in rem relying in good faith on the registration in the land register is protected in that acquisition (m.1023). The two provisions meet in every purchase from a married seller, and the way to keep the transaction out of that meeting is factual rather than legal: establish the seller’s marital status and the use of the dwelling before signing, and obtain the other spouse’s express consent where the property is or may be the family home. A buyer living abroad should note that the question is about how the dwelling is used, not about how often the family is there.

12. Buying Property in Turkey: Kat İrtifakı or Kat Mülkiyeti on the Deed

A deed for an apartment says one of two things, and the difference is a fact about the building rather than a technicality.

Condominium ownership (kat mülkiyeti) and condominium easement (kat irtifakı) both arise by official deed and by registration in the land register, and condominium ownership cannot be established over only one or several parts of an immovable without the ownership of the whole main immovable being converted (634 sayılı Kat Mülkiyeti Kanunu m.10). Both are genuine registered positions, so both appear on a real title deed.

What separates them is what the Law requires for the conversion. To establish condominium ownership, the owner or all co-owners must apply to the land registry administration with the documents the Law lists (m.12), and those documents include the architectural project drawn by its author and approved by the competent public authority, the occupancy permit, and a management plan signed by the owner or owners. A deed that still reads kat irtifakı therefore tells a buyer that the conversion has not been completed, and the occupancy permit is part of what completes it. It costs nothing to read, and it is on the document the buyer already has.

13. Buying Property in Istanbul or Antalya: What the Location Changes

Buying property in Istanbul or Antalya follows the same national rules as anywhere else in Turkey. The Land Registry Law does not set a separate acquisition regime for either city; it does empower the President to restrict or suspend acquisitions by geographical region (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/3), which is one more reason the framework has to be checked on the day. What the location changes is which other laws reach the parcel, and several of them come into play most often on these two coastlines and in these two urban markets.

13.1. Buying Property in Istanbul or Antalya: the District Carries the Ten-Percent Cap

Buying property in Istanbul or Antalya does not use the city as the unit for the area limit. The ten-percent ceiling is measured against the privately owned area of the district (ilçe), not the province (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35/1). Istanbul and Antalya are provinces made up of many districts, so the relevant question is whether the ceiling has been reached in the specific district where the parcel sits, and a purchase in one district of Antalya says nothing about the position in another. As explained above, that figure depends on what other foreign buyers have already acquired there, which is why it is answered through the land registry channel.

13.2. Buying Property on the Antalya or Istanbul Coast: the Shore Belongs to Everyone

Buying property on the coast brings in the Coastal Law. Coasts are under the rule and disposal of the State and are open to everyone’s equal and free use, and in using the coast and the shore strip the public interest is considered first (3621 sayılı Kıyı Kanunu m.5). The coast is the area between the shoreline and the coastal edge line, the natural limit of the sand, shingle, rock and similar ground formed by the movement of the water (m.4).

Two consequences matter for a buyer. A listing that promises a “private beach” is describing ground the Law places under the State’s disposal and opens to everyone. And buildings in the shore strip may come no closer than fifty metres to the coastal edge line, with the land between that setback and the line usable only for footpaths, walking, rest, viewing and recreation (m.5). Planning and development on the coast and the shore strip require the coastal edge line to have been determined; where it has not been, it must be determined within three months of a request (m.5).

13.3. Buying Property in Istanbul on the Bosphorus: a Separate Zoning Law

Buying property in Istanbul near the Bosphorus adds a statute that applies to that area alone. The Bosphorus Law exists to protect the cultural and historical values and natural beauty of the Istanbul Bosphorus Area and to limit construction that would increase population density there (2960 sayılı Boğaziçi Kanunu m.1). The Bosphorus Area is made up of the shore strip, the foreground view zone, the background view zone and the zones of influence, as marked on the plan annexed to the Law (m.2/a).

Buildings in the Bosphorus Area are built according to that Law and the principles of the zoning plans, and those contrary to them are demolished (m.3/e). The land-use decisions set for parcels in the zoning plans are recorded in the land register (m.3/n). For a buyer this ties the Bosphorus question back to the title deed: the use permitted on the parcel is something to read on the register before the price is agreed, not something to infer from the view.

13.4. Buying a Flat in Istanbul or Antalya in a Building Marked as Risky

Buying a flat in Istanbul or Antalya in an older building raises a question the ownership line will not answer: whether the building has been identified as a risky structure under the urban transformation law. A risky structure is one, inside or outside a risk area, that has completed its economic life or is shown by scientific and technical data to carry a risk of collapse or heavy damage (6306 sayılı Kanun m.2/1-d).

Once a structure is identified as risky, the identification is notified to the land registry directorate within ten working days to be entered in the declarations column of the land register (6306 sayılı Kanun m.3/2). Owners may object to the identification within fifteen days (m.3/1). After that, decisions on the parcel, including rebuilding, the sale of shares and redevelopment in return for flats or revenue sharing, are taken by an absolute majority of the co-owners according to their shares (m.6/1). A foreign buyer of one flat in such a building joins that majority as a co-owner and is bound by its decisions, so the declarations column is the first place to look.

13.5. Buying Property in Istanbul or Antalya to Let to Holidaymakers

Buying property in Istanbul or Antalya with the plan of letting it for short stays runs into a permit regime introduced by Law No. 7464. A tourism rental is a letting of a dwelling for at most one hundred days, and lettings of more than one hundred days at a time fall outside the Law (7464 sayılı Kanun m.1/3, m.2/1-g). A permit must be obtained before the rental contract is made, and the permit is issued by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, which may act through the governorship (m.3/1-2).

The permit application must include a decision taken unanimously by all flat owners of the building in which the dwelling sits; in a residential estate with several buildings, the condition applies only to the building concerned (m.3/3). In buildings with more than three independent units, permits may be issued in the name of the same landlord for at most twenty-five percent of the units (m.3/4). Letting without a permit is met with an administrative fine for each dwelling and a fifteen-day period to obtain the permit, followed by a higher fine if the letting continues (m.4/1-a, b). Administrative fines are increased at the start of each calendar year by the revaluation rate (5326 sayılı Kabahatler Kanunu m.17/7), so the amounts written in the Law are base figures and are not reproduced here. A buyer who expects rental income from short stays is therefore relying on the consent of every other owner in the building, and that consent has to be secured before, not after, the purchase.

14. Buying Property in Turkey Off-Plan: Contract Form and Delivery

Where the home is bought before completion, a separate statute applies alongside the acquisition rules, and it gives the buyer unusually firm ground.

No prepaid housing contract may be concluded before a building permit is obtained for the project (6502 sayılı Kanun m.40). The sale must be registered on the land register, or the sale promise must be made as a notarial deed drawn up in due form; otherwise the seller may not afterwards raise the invalidity of the contract in a way that operates against the consumer, and the seller may not ask the consumer for any payment, or for any document placing the consumer under an obligation, unless a valid contract has been made (m.41).

The consumer has fourteen days to withdraw from a prepaid housing sale contract without giving any reason and without paying a penalty, and it is enough that notice of withdrawal is sent to the seller within that period; the seller bears the burden of proving that the consumer was informed of the right (m.43/1). Delivery within the period undertaken in the contract is compulsory, and that period may in no case exceed forty-eight months from the date of the contract (m.44/1). Where the seller does not perform its obligations at all or does not perform them properly, it may not claim any payment from the consumer (m.45/2).

The foreign buyer’s right to acquire the property and the seller’s obligations under the purchase contract are separate enquiries, and a purchase can satisfy one while failing the other. Registered sales and notarial sale promises, withdrawal after the fourteen days, the capped compensation and the refund mechanism are set out in the off-plan property buying guide.

15. Inheriting Property in Turkey: Which Law Governs

Buyers plan the purchase and rarely the succession, and the two are connected differently. Succession is governed by the national law of the deceased, but Turkish law applies to immovables situated in Turkey; the provisions concerning the grounds for the opening of the succession, its acquisition and its division are governed by the law of the country where the estate is situated (5718 sayılı MÖHUK m.20/1-2).

The connecting factor is the location, not the category of asset and not the nationality of the deceased. So a single estate can be governed by more than one law at the same time, and the Turkish flat is governed by Turkish law while assets elsewhere may not be.

Form and capacity are connected separately again. A disposition upon death made in a form compliant with the national law of the deceased is also valid (m.20/4), and capacity to make a disposition upon death is governed by the national law of the disposing party at the time the disposition is made (m.20/5). A will drawn up abroad is therefore not disqualified merely because it does not follow Turkish formalities. A document showing the status of heir is issued, upon application, to those determined to be statutory heirs (4721 sayılı Türk Medeni Kanunu m.598).

One link back to the acquisition rules is easy to miss. Inheritance is named expressly in the breach provision: immovables acquired by inheritance outside the limits in the first paragraph fall within the liquidation regime described below (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35). Inheriting is not an acquisition that has to pass the eligibility gate in the same way a purchase does, but the area limits still have a consequence attached to them.

15.1. Inheritance Tax on Property in Turkey

The transmission of property situated in Turkey from one person to another by inheritance or in any gratuitous manner is subject to inheritance and transfer tax (7338 sayılı Kanun m.1). The charge attaches to the location of the property rather than to the nationality of the heir, which is the same connecting logic as the immovables rule above.

What follows once Turkish law governs the immovable, including who the statutory heirs are and in what shares, the reserved share, disclaiming the estate and the requirement that heirs act together, is set out in Turkish inheritance law for foreigners, and the document itself in the certificate of inheritance in Turkey.

16. Selling Property in Turkey: the Five-Year Capital Gains Rule

Gains arising from the disposal, within five years from the date of acquisition, of the immovable property and rights the Law lists are capital gains, whatever the manner of acquisition, except for property acquired gratuitously (193 sayılı Gelir Vergisi Kanunu mükerrer m.80).

Three features of that provision decide most cases. The five years run from the date of acquisition, so the date that matters is the registration of the purchase rather than the moment the owner decides to sell. Property acquired gratuitously is carved out, which is why a property that came by inheritance is treated differently from one that was bought. And the Law defines disposal broadly: sale, transfer and assignment for consideration, exchange, barter, expropriation, nationalisation, and contribution to a commercial company as capital all count. Putting the property into a company as a capital contribution is a disposal in the same way a sale is.

The Law also provides an annual exempt amount for capital gains. That figure is revalued, so the number that applies is the one in force for the year of the sale and it should be verified against the legislation current at that time rather than taken from any article, this one included. A property counted towards exceptional citizenship carries its own transfer restriction on the register as well, and those conditions are set out in Turkish citizenship by investment.

17. Buying Property in Turkey in Breach: Liquidation and Conversion into Money

The Law does not leave a non-compliant acquisition in place. Immovables and limited rights in rem that are acquired contrary to the provisions of the Article, that the relevant Ministry and administrations determine to be used contrary to the purpose of acquisition, for which the relevant Ministry was not approached within the period, or whose projects were not realised within the period, together with those acquired by inheritance outside the limits within the scope of the first paragraph, are liquidated and converted into money if they are not liquidated by the owner within a period not exceeding one year to be given by the Ministry of Finance, and the price is paid to the entitled person (2644 sayılı Tapu Kanunu m.35).

Five distinct triggers sit in that sentence: acquisition contrary to the Article; use contrary to the purpose of acquisition; failure to approach the Ministry in time; failure to realise the project in time; and inheritance beyond the first-paragraph limits. The owner is given up to one year to liquidate, and if that period passes the property is liquidated and converted into money, with the price paid to the entitled person. The owner is not expropriated without payment, but the choice of whether to keep the property is gone.

A parallel provision applies to Turkey-established foreign-capital companies: immovables and limited rights in rem determined to have been acquired or used contrary to Article 36 are liquidated and converted into money in the same way if the owner does not liquidate them within the period given by the Ministry of Finance (m.36/7).

18. Buying Property in Turkey, Residence and Citizenship

Property acquisition affects status as well as ownership, and the two routes it touches are separate.

Residence permit. Foreigners who own immovable property in Turkey are one of the categories to whom a short-term residence permit may be granted (6458 sayılı Kanun m.31/1-b). Ownership alone does not settle the question: a 2024 amendment added a paragraph providing that the nature and the value of the immovable that will form the basis of a short-term residence permit are determined by the Ministry (m.31/6). So the property has to meet a standard set outside the Law itself, and that standard is checked against the text in force on the day of the application. The permit types and their conditions are set out in residence permit types in Turkey.

Citizenship. The investment route does not run through the property rules at all. The President may grant Turkish citizenship, provided there is no impediment in terms of national security and public order, to foreigners who obtain a residence permit for making an investment in the scope and amount the President determines (5901 sayılı Kanun m.12/1-b, referring to 6458 sayılı Kanun m.31/1-j). The amount is fixed in the implementing regulation: immovable property of at least USD 400,000 or the equivalent in foreign currency, with condominium ownership or condominium easement established or a building on the land, bought with a three-year no-sale annotation placed on the title records; alternatively, a notarial sale-promise contract for the same amount paid upfront, with a three-year undertaking against transfer and cancellation annotated on the register (Türk Vatandaşlığı Kanununun Uygulanmasına İlişkin Yönetmelik m.20/2-b).

That threshold is set by regulation and has been amended before, so it has to be read against the text in force on the day of the investment rather than taken from any secondary source. The route, the no-sale annotation and the certificate of conformity are covered in Turkish citizenship by investment, and investment is only one route among several, all compared in how to get Turkish citizenship.