Foreigners may
purchase land and property in
Turkey
on their own names provided that properties
are located in towns (i.e. there must be municipality in the area where the
property is and the property must be situated within the boundaries of that
municipality or borough), not in villages or rural areas and outside of military
zones.
In order to
acquire the title of a property, an application has to be submitted to the local
Land Registry Office in which the property is situated. After carrying out
necessary searches and checks for the abovementioned requirements, the transfer
of the title is done by the Land Registry Office. During the transaction, the
proofs or the documents concerning the transfer of the full purchase price into
Turkey
must be presented to the Land Registry Office.
Also a 1.5% per cent duty (i.e. tax) both for the purchaser and seller is due
and collected during the transaction. There exists an annual property tax,
collected by the municipalities (i.e. local governments) at the rate of 0.3 per
cent for private buildings. The newly built properties are exempt from the
annual property tax for 5 years. All properties are subject to revaluation for
every five years for tax purposes. The acquired property may be resold or rented
out and the proceeds may be transferred out of
Turkey
. Different regulations apply when a property
is purchased for business related purposes.
(Information courtesy of the Turkish
Consulate,
London
,
England
.)