The issue of foreigners acquiring a real estate in Turkey is the most researched subject.

In this article we will explain what the foreigners should pay attention to, before and during the deed transaction and briefly guide the procedure.

The transactions regarding the Acquisition Of Property By Foreigners are determined by the Land Registry Law No:2644 and it is made clear under what conditions a person can buy an immovable. Persons must comply with these law and its conditions. In this context who are citizens of the Foreign Countries which are designed by the Council of Ministers , have right to acquire a real estate in Turkey provided that they comply with the legal restrictions.

Here are the procedures to be followed respectively

Things to be done before the real estate is acquired meaning before the title deed transaction.

First of all we would like to underline that; contrast to the many applications in Europe, purchase and sale of real estates are not carried out at the Notary. In Turkey only The Preliminary Contract for Real Estate Sale and External Sales are made at the Notary, The Deed Sales Transactions must be made at the Land Registry Office (Office of the Register of the Deeds).The Acquisition of the Real Estate by having a sales contract at the Notary is simply not possible.

In Turkey, a person who would like to acquire an immovable (real estate) should check over the Register of The Deeds after he decided which real estate to acquire. We would like to state that Deed Registers are open to everybody’s inspection who shows his concern. For this reason after deciding which real estate to be acquired, first thing to do is to determine if there is a mortgage, precautionary attachment by the court or due payments to the third parties by checking over the Registry Office’s records.

In the next step, we also advise you to check if the Housing- Building License exists on the real estate or if there is an application for it, from the Municipality where the Real Estate locates in order not to have any problems in the future.

After gathering information about the Real Estate, preparing a contract between the Buyer and the Seller which states the responsibilities of the both sides over the transaction, again will avoid problems which can occur in the future.

Following the preparation of the contract according to the new application published in 04.03.2019, the Real Estate should be evaluated by the Expert Witnesses. Thus, within the Law’s Context it is obligatory to obtain an official report from the designated institutes and establishments. It should not be forgotten the validity of the reports are three months.

In other words the report should be used at The Registry Office for deed transaction within three months. After completing the preliminary phase and before applying to The Registers Office, it is very important to know that all the documents should be prepared in full.

Required documents at the transaction stage

If the letter of Attorney issued outside Turkey then the original and the notarized copy of the power of attorney with its translation are required in order to operate.

We would like to point out that the sides can act personally in the transaction or they can be represented by an attorney with a Power of Attorney they are granted. It must be noted that in this kind of transactions, The Power of Attorney should include all the authority related to that transaction otherwise problems will be inevitable.

In addition we should also point out that, The Power of Attorney prepared abroad should be prepared in the native language of the person who would like to acquire a real estate in Turkey and should have Apostille stamp on it.

In conclusion; after completing the process stated above, any dispute on the transaction will be carried to and solved in the Turkish courts. For this reason we advise you to have Professional help in order not to have problems or bother with them yourselves.