Turkish law does have an escrow: it is the notary’s deposit, and it is set out in articles 62 to 67 of the Notaries Act (Noterlik Kanunu No. 1512). A notary holds property brought to be kept or to be delivered to a person, must pay a money deposit into the notarial deposit account at a bank by the next day at the latest in the name of the person entitled to it, and may release it outside the conditions recorded in the deposit minute only on the consent of both parties or on a court decision. What Turkey does not have is a private, licensed escrow industry. The choice a foreign buyer actually makes is between the notary’s deposit, a contractually blocked bank account, an annotated promise to sell, and a payment structure timed to the registry, and the choice must be made before any money leaves the buyer’s account.
Is there escrow in Turkish law?
Yes, in substance, under a different name. The instrument is the emanet, the deposit held by a notary, and the notary is a public officer: article 1 of the Notaries Act defines the notarial service as a public service whose purpose is to secure legal certainty and prevent disputes. The four provisions that make it function as escrow are these.
| Article | What it provides |
|---|---|
| m.62 | The notary holds items brought “to be kept or to be delivered to a person”. The deposit is constituted by a minute (tutanak); the depositor takes one copy and the person for whom the deposit was made is formally served with another. |
| m.63 | On request the deposit is placed in a container sealed by the depositor and the notary together and held at a national bank. |
| m.64 | Where the deposit is money, the notary must pay it into the notarial deposit current account at a bank by the next day at the latest, recording the name, surname and address of the person entitled. It is paid out to that person by the bank against a cheque issued by the notary’s office. |
| m.67 | The lock. A deposit may be handed to anyone outside the conditions written in the minute only on the consent of the parties or on a court decision. Neither side can withdraw the money unilaterally. |
Two further provisions matter if things go wrong. Under article 65, a deposit left unclaimed for a year after the end of the custody period, or on which the fees are not paid, is sold at auction after formal notice, with the balance placed at the bank. Under article 66 an unsold deposit passes to the Treasury, as does deposited money once it prescribes. The consolidated text is published by the state at mevzuat.gov.tr.
What the statute does not do is equally important, and no one should be told otherwise. It sets no minimum or maximum amount, it does not oblige a particular notary to accept a particular deposit, and it says nothing about how commonly notaries accept the full price of a property. Those are questions of practice, and they are settled by asking the specific notarial office before the structure is written into the contract.
Since June 2022 the same officer can also complete the sale
Law No. 7413 of 23 June 2022 changed what a notary may do with immovable property, and it changed the practical answer to the escrow question.
- Article 60(3), as amended, empowers a notary to draw up a promise-to-sell contract for immovable property and, at the request of either party and against the fees, to annotate that contract on the land register through the land registry information system. The same provision empowers the notary to draw up the sale contract itself.
- Article 61/A, added by the same statute, states that a contract for the sale of immovable property may also be made by notaries. The notary issues an application document, takes account of every restriction over the property, and observes the limits laid down in other legislation. The title records reach the notary through the land registry information system, and where they are incomplete the missing items are requested from the land registry directorate and supplied by it.
The consequence is that one public officer can now hold the price under articles 62 to 67 and execute the transfer, which is the gap that a bank account and a separate registry appointment otherwise have to bridge between them.
Why money paid before registration is unsecured
Ownership of Turkish immovable property passes on registration, not on signature and not on payment. Article 237 of the Turkish Code of Obligations (No. 6098) makes the point twice over: a sale of immovable property is valid only if the contract is drawn up in official form, and a promise to sell is likewise void unless made in official form.
That single article disposes of the most common loss this office sees. A reservation form signed at a sales office, a private contract exchanged by email, a receipt from an agent: none of them creates any right in the property, and money paid against them is an unsecured loan to a stranger. A promise to sell is worth having only when it is made in official form and annotated on the register, at which point it binds the property against later transfers for its term.
Being abroad is not a reason to send money to an intermediary either. Article 26 of the Land Registry Act (No. 2644), in the paragraph added by Law No. 7181 of 4 July 2019, provides that where the parties to a contract transferring ownership of immovable property are at different land registry directorates or at a Turkish mission abroad, their declarations may be taken separately by the officials and the contract completed on that basis.
The four structures, and what each one actually secures
| Structure | What holds the money | Its real weakness |
|---|---|---|
| Notary deposit (Notaries Act m.62 to 67) | A public officer, in a bank account, under a recorded minute; release outside the recorded terms needs consent or a court order. | Availability and the fee are matters of practice, and the conditions in the minute must be drafted as carefully as any contract, because they are what the notary will apply. |
| Blocked bank account | The bank, under the agreement that created the block. | There is no dedicated statutory regime behind it. Everything depends on the release wording, and a bank will apply that wording literally. |
| Notarised promise to sell, annotated on the deed | Nothing holds the money. The property is what is secured, for the term of the annotation. | It protects the buyer’s claim to the property, not the cash; it must be in official form to exist at all. |
| Payment timed to the registry | Nothing, by design. The largest instalment falls due at the transfer appointment, against simultaneous registration. | Requires a seller who will accept it, and it does not solve an off-plan purchase where there is nothing yet to register. |
A mortgage registered over the property in the buyer’s favour is sometimes proposed as a fifth structure for an unavoidable large advance. It works in an ordinary purchase. It is the wrong advice for a buyer who intends to apply for Turkish citizenship, for the reason set out below.
If the purchase is for citizenship, the money route is fixed by regulation
The 400,000 USD real estate route to Turkish citizenship carries its own payment mechanics, and they override the freedom to structure that an ordinary buyer has. Under article 20(10) of the implementing regulation, the foreign currency for that route is sold before the transaction to a bank operating in Turkiye and by that bank to the Central Bank. The Central Bank’s implementation instruction of 16 May 2022 limits the currencies that may be sold to it to the US dollar, the euro, the pound sterling and the Swiss franc. A transfer already denominated in Turkish lira does not work, because there is nothing left to sell.
Two consequences follow for the escrow question. The price cannot sit indefinitely with a third party outside the banking channel, because the conversion has to happen first and has to be evidenced. And a mortgage or a restrictive annotation on the title deed disqualifies the property for the route, so the very security a cautious buyer would otherwise register in his own favour is the thing that would cost him the application. Buyers on this route are the ones for whom the notary deposit and the registry-timed payment are worth the most. The route itself is set out in our guide to Turkish citizenship by investment.
Deposit as a remedy is a different instrument
Articles 107 to 111 of the Code of Obligations are frequently cited in English as “escrow in Turkish law”. They are not. They are the debtor’s escape when the creditor will not or cannot accept performance.
- Article 107. Where the creditor is in default, the debtor may deposit the thing owed and be discharged, at the creditor’s risk and cost. The place of deposit is fixed by the judge at the place of performance, although commercial goods may be placed in a warehouse without a court order.
- Article 108. Where the thing is unsuitable for deposit, perishable, or expensive to keep, the debtor may with the judge’s permission have it sold at auction and deposit the proceeds.
- Article 109. The debtor may take the deposit back unless the creditor has declared acceptance or the deposit has discharged a pledge; on recovery the claim revives with all its accessories.
- Article 111. The same right applies where performance is impossible, through no fault of the debtor, because of doubt over who owns the claim or who the creditor is.
This is a remedy in a dispute, not a way of securing a purchase price. Confusing the two produces advice that sends a buyer to court to achieve what a deposit minute would have achieved before the money moved.
Questions foreign buyers ask
Can a foreign escrow company hold the price instead?
It can hold money, but it holds it outside every mechanism above. It is not a notary under articles 62 to 67, it is not a Turkish bank, and its terms are governed by whatever law its contract chooses. On a citizenship purchase it also sits outside the conversion route the regulation requires. The question to ask of any such offer is which Turkish provision would make it release the money if it refused.
Is the notary deposit expensive?
Notarial charges are set by tariff rather than negotiated, and the deposit attracts fees and expenses that accrue while the deposit is held, which article 65 makes recoverable. The figure to compare it against is not zero: it is the cost of recovering a payment made to the wrong party, which is a lawsuit.
What happens to the deposit if the sale falls through?
Whatever the minute says happens, and nothing else. That is the point of article 67, and it is why the release conditions are the commercial heart of the arrangement. If the minute is silent on a scenario, unwinding it needs the other side’s consent or a court.
Does an off-plan purchase change the answer?
It sharpens it. There is no registered unit yet to annotate or mortgage, so the security has to come from the payment structure and from the deposit itself, and the developer’s willingness to accept either is the real test of the project.
Work with counsel before the money moves
Serka Law Firm structures and executes the payment side of Turkish property purchases for foreign buyers, from the release conditions in a deposit minute through the registry appointment, and acts when a payment has already gone wrong. Write to info@serkalaw.com with the contract and the payment schedule you have been offered and you will get a written view on what it actually secures. Our wider practice is set out under buying property in Turkey as a foreigner, and the transaction as a whole is covered in our guide to Turkish real estate law for foreign buyers.
General information, not legal advice. Turkish law; verify your specific situation with qualified counsel.
Related reading
- The checks that come before the payment structure: our real estate due diligence checklist for foreign buyers.
- What to look for on the deed itself: title deed red flags for foreign buyers in Turkey.
- To have a purchase run by counsel from title search through registration, see our real estate lawyer in Turkey for foreign buyers.