Acquisition of Turkish Citizenship

In accordance with the Law amendment that has been come into force on September 19^th 2018, non-Turkish citizens who purchase a property worth 250,000 USD can acquire Turkish Citizenship.

First step for a non-Turkish citizen who is willing to become a Turkish Citizen is to purchase a property worth minimum of USD 250.000. There are certain laws to follow when purchasing a property;

• In order to obtain the title deed, non-Turkish citizen must have a Turkish tax number which can easily be obtained from the tax offices.
• Property’s tax excluded price must worth 250,000 USD.
• The title deed owner and applicant must be the same person.
• Even though the payment made in U.S. dollars, the price of the property will be written in Turkish Liras on the title deed. The exchange rate will be adopted according to the current day’s effective selling rate of official Turkish Central Bank.
• In case a non-Turkish citizen will purchase the property in Turkish Lira, the exchange rate will be calculated according to current day’s effective selling rate of the official Turkish Central Bank
• The property must be purchased from a Turkish person or Turkish company established with a Turkish capital.
• The payment method must be via wire transfer exclusively from non-Turkish citizen’s personal bank account to the seller’s bank account. Both seller’s and buyer’s bank receipts should be documented and stamped by the relevant banks that would prove the wire transfer has completed. The payment will not be accepted if it is made in cash. If a non-Turkish citizen already has a bank account in a Turkish bank, he/she can make the transfer from that account as well.

There are two methods to acquire Turkish citizenship by acquiring real estate. One of them is to apply with a title deed and the second one is to apply with notarized primary sales contract if the title has not been transferred yet. The primary sales contract must be made in front of a notary. In this context, after receiving the title deed or receiving the original copy of the sales contract which is signed in front of the notary, the attorney or non-Turkish citizen should go the relevant land and registry Office.

He/She has to put an annotation to the title deed that he/she will not sell the property within 3 years. In the meantime, the property is rentable.

A non-Turkish citizen can purchase multiple properties provided that the total value of the properties worth more than USD 250.000. Also, multiple non-Turkish citizens can purchase one property provided that each of their parts will worth USD 250.000.

One of the most important parts of this process is the valuation report. The valuation report is required to be prepared by specialists who are licensed and authorized by the capital market board, in order to determine whether the acquired property is equal to the amount specified in the regulation (USD 250.000). The period of validity for the valuation report is up to 3 months before the purchase of the property.

Once the title deed, valuation report and receipts of the payment are obtained, non-Turkish citizen or the attorney can make the written promise (not to sell the property for 3 years) in the Land and Registry office. After the promise is made, the department of foreign affairs will send ‘’the title deed conformity document’’ to the relevant person.

There is one more document that needs to be obtained before starting to fill the first application form, the health insurance policy. Non-Turkish citizen must have a health insurance which is valid in Turkey. As the insurance period should cover the period of residence time required, the health insurance must be valid for at least one year. The health insurance should be supplied from Turkey.

After completing these steps, non-Turkish citizen or the attorney must fill up the residence permit application form on the internet. The form requires detailed information about the applicant’s status such as accommodation, civil status, yearly income and health insurance policy information.

Once the form is filled the non-Turkish citizen should go to ‘’ foreigner citizenship application office’’ with the requested documents and have the appointment with the authorities there on weekdays from 9:30 a.m. to 4.30 p.m. In case he has an Attorney acting behalf of him, the Attorney will be attending the Residence permit appointment with the client. This residence permit process is an exclusive type of residence permit made for non-Turkish investors in Turkey.

After submitting the required documents to the authorities on the residence permit appointment, the acquisition of Turkish citizenship process officially begins. The residence permit card will be prepared within a week and after receiving the card, then non-Turkish citizen or the attorney will fill up the Turkish Citizenship Application form from the official website of the government. In case non-Turkish citizen does not have an attorney, he/she must attend to the Turkish Citizenship Acquisition appointment once again at the foreigner citizenship application office with additional requested documents. On the other hand, ıf an attorney is acting on his behalf, he doesn’t need to be present in the second appointment, the attorney can legally carry out the transaction’s behalf of the client. This will be the second step of the Acquisition of Turkish Citizenship process.

The non-Turkish citizen, his spouse and children under the age of 18 will acquire Turkish Citizenship automatically once the main applicant in the family becomes Turkish Citizen.

Once the first (residence permit) appointment is made, it is expected to take about six months for the process of the acquisition of Turkish Citizenship to be concluded.

The Turkish Government will examine the file of each individual non-Turkish investor and based on their research they will finalize the application.

In case a non-Turkish citizen doesn’t have time to come to Turkey for performing all the transactions, he shall give power of attorney to an experienced Law Firm/Attorney from the Turkish Embassy or a notary in Turkey and the attorney will process the file on his/her behalf.

Briefly, in case a non-Turkish citizen has an Attorney acting behalf on him/her, he or she  must be present in Turkey only for the first Residence permit appointment after the appointment the Attorney will manage all the transactions behalf of the client. After the finalization of Turkish Citizenship acquisition process, non-Turkish citizen and his family shall come to Turkey to receive their Turkish id cards and passports.