Turkish Citizenship by Real Estate Investment: the $400,000 Requirements in 2026

Turkish citizenship by buying property in 2026: the requirements, and the valuation rule of 28 September 2026

Short answer: in 2026, Turkish citizenship by real estate investment requires property of at least USD 400,000, measured at the Central Bank rate on the date of determination (Article 20(2)(b) and 20(6) of the Regulation on the Implementation of the Turkish Citizenship Law), bought with foreign currency sold to a bank in Türkiye and by that bank to the Central Bank before the transaction (Article 20(10)), and kept for three years under a no-sale annotation on the title deed; the Certificate of Conformity then opens the residence and citizenship file. The spouse and the children who are under 18 or dependent are included in the same file. What changed this year is the valuation: since 28 September 2026 the report may come from any valuation firm the Capital Markets Board of Türkiye (SPK) has authorized, ordered through Web Tapu, and the value confirmation built on it (TTB) may be up to twelve months older than the application for the citizenship transaction at the registry, where before that only GEDAŞ, the TOKİ affiliate, valued units for citizenship and the TTB was good for six months (TKGM circulars 2024/2 and 2024/4, as amended on 28 September 2026).

Before a deposit is paid on a unit, Serka Law Firm checks the seller, the deed and the valuation, and then carries the file to the passport; the mandate is on our Turkish citizenship by investment lawyer page.

Decision table: what has to be fixed before you pay

The 2026 annulments came from this route

On 4 August 2026 the Ministry of Interior announced an operation against forged real estate valuation reports: 72 suspects caught in 16 provinces and, after reviews by the Land Registry, the Tax Inspection Board and the General Directorate of Security, the investment eligibility certificates of 1,150 investors cancelled and the citizenship of 5,391 people, families included, annulled. With 263 investors and 743 people withdrawn on public order and national security findings, 1,413 investors and 6,134 people in all lost the citizenship under Articles 31 and 40 of Citizenship Law No. 5901 (the Ministry’s statement of 4 August 2026). The value of the unit is therefore the part of a property file that is read again after the passport: the figure in the valuation report, the value confirmation (TTB), the Foreign Exchange Purchase Certificate and the payment receipts. Since 28 September 2026 the report may come from any valuation firm the Capital Markets Board of Türkiye has authorized (TKGM circular 2024/4 as amended). What an investor whose certificate or citizenship has already been cancelled can do, and in what time, is on our page on the 2026 annulments and their appeal.

Who reads the value for you matters as much as who writes it. A lawyer introduced or paid by the seller, the developer or the agency that brought you to the unit has a conflict of interest with you: Article 38(b) of Attorneyship Law No. 1136 obliges an advocate to refuse a matter in which he has acted or given an opinion for a party whose interest is opposed, and Article 48 punishes with six months to one year of imprisonment both the intermediary who brings work to an advocate for a fee or any benefit and the advocate who uses him. Ask who pays the lawyer before the valuation report, the TTB and the deed are read for you, and have them read by an independent advocate who answers to you alone; the checks are on our page for the Turkish citizenship by investment lawyer.

What the regulation requires that most property listings do not mention

The purchase price does not simply have to reach the threshold. Article 20 paragraph 10 of the Regulation puts the real estate route, letter (b), through the same currency chain as the deposit routes: the foreign currency is sold, before the transaction, to a bank operating in Turkey and by that bank on to the Central Bank of the Republic of Türkiye. The Foreign Exchange Purchase Certificate that proves it is not a formality, and the Central Bank implementation instruction of 21 January 2022 carries a content rule for that certificate written specifically for this route. Two further paragraphs decide files: paragraph 6 fixes the value at the Central Bank rate on the determination date, so the figure is tested once and not re-tested if the currency moves afterwards; and paragraph 8 permits movement between the qualifying investment types while the three year period runs, so a buyer who cannot complete a purchase is not automatically back at the start.

Paragraph 3 lists the application documents, and a criminal record certificate is not among them. The Directorate General of Civil Registration and Citizenship Affairs, which receives the application, lists one all the same: a certificate from the authorities of the applicant’s own country, issued within the last six months (its citizenship FAQ), so it is obtained close to the filing day.

From 1 December 2026: the price passes through the secure payment system

A purchase that completes on or after 1 December 2026 meets a second payment rule beside the currency chain. Under additional Article 1 of the Regulation on Real Estate Trade (Taşınmaz Ticareti Hakkında Yönetmelik), added on 29 April 2026, where any part of the price of a property sale is paid in cash, by transfer, by electronic funds transfer or by another method the Ministry of Trade names, the price is paid through a payment system built so that the ownership and the price change hands at the same moment (Güvenli Ödeme Sistemi); where a bank or a financing company lends part of the price, the part not lent goes through it. Each transaction carries a usage fee, deducted from the price passed to the seller. The start was first 1 July 2026, which the Ministry moved to 1 October; the amendment of 1 October 2026 fixed 1 December 2026, and the Ministry may extend it by up to three months (provisional Article 10; official text). Which sales stay outside the system, the pilot and the fee are left to a protocol between the Ministry of Trade, the Ministry of Environment, Urbanisation and Climate Change and an integrator the Ministry authorizes, and that protocol is not published; neither text says whether a citizenship purchase, whose currency is sold to the Central Bank before the transaction under Article 20(10) of the citizenship Regulation, is among the sales left outside. A citizenship purchase set to complete after 30 November 2026 is therefore planned with both the currency chain and the payment system in view, and a page that still gives 1 October 2026 as the start is out of date.

Who you buy from decides the file before the price does

Three disqualifiers sit outside the price and are checked first, because none of them can be cured after the deed is signed. The seller has to be a Turkish natural or legal person, so a property bought from another foreign national does not qualify however much it cost. The Land Registry's guide of 9 December 2024 to circular 2024/4 completes the seller test: the unit may not be registered to a foreigner, to a person naturalized through investment under Article 12(1)(b), to the buyer's Turkish first-degree relatives or to a company in which the buyer or any of his first-degree relatives, Turkish or not, is a partner or a manager, and a resale unit may not have come to its owner from the buyer or his first-degree relatives, nor within the last three years from a foreigner or such a naturalized citizen. A property that has already been used in someone else’s citizenship application does not qualify a second time, which is why the registry history of the unit matters more than the listing. A mortgaged or attached unit can still be bought for the file, but if a creditor later has it sold by force, the investment certificate is cancelled and the Directorate General of Civil Registration and Citizenship Affairs is told; a statutory mortgage, or an annotation that could change the ownership such as a promise to sell or a pending suit, keeps the unit out altogether (the guide’s rules on encumbered property).

Two funding points follow from the same logic. A Turkish bank loan does not count towards the threshold, because the amount has to arrive through the currency chain described above rather than be created inside Turkey. Crypto is not accepted directly and is converted through the banking channel first, so that the payment leaves the same evidence trail as any other transfer. The notarized pre-sale agreement states the full price, and a contract written below the real figure destroys the file it was meant to cheapen.

What the property buys, and what it does not

The property is not a purchase of the nationality, which carries no price; what Article 20(2)(b) of the Implementing Regulation recognizes is a qualifying real estate investment of at least USD 400,000, bought from a Turkish seller and held for three years under an annotation on the deed, after which the decision is the President’s under Article 12(1)(b) of Law No. 5901. Meeting those conditions gives no absolute right, as Article 10(1) of the same law says in terms, and a property bought at the right price but from the wrong seller or with a charge on the deed qualifies for nothing.

Several units, a share, a loan or an off-plan unit: what counts toward USD 400,000

The Land Registry’s guide to this route, annexed to its circular 2024/4, answers these questions in terms. Several units: there is no limit on the number of units bought by sale, as long as together they reach the amount; the US dollar values on each unit’s amount certificate (TTB) are added up, and where a TTB shows more than the foreign exchange certificate (DAB) presented for that unit, only the DAB’s amount counts. A promise to sell: a notarised promise to sell carries the file only for a unit under condominium or construction servitude (kat mülkiyeti or kat irtifakı), the whole amount has to be reached in one contract, which may cover several units, and paid at the latest on the contract’s date; applications on more than one promise to sell are not taken, and a shortfall left by units already bought cannot be made up with a promise to sell.

Whose name: the Regulation counts the foreigner’s own acquisitions only, so a unit bought in the name of a spouse or a child, or of a company the buyer manages or is a partner in, does not count toward his amount. A share: a unit bought as a share does not qualify, so two foreigners who buy one unit together as co-owners have no file on it, while a foreigner who buys the whole of a unit registered to several owners does. A loan: where the unit is bought with a foreign currency loan, the loan is deducted from the price and the rest has to reach the amount; once the loan is paid and the mortgage struck off, the DAB amounts have to reach it. Once only: a unit carries one citizenship file, and once its investment certificate (TYTB) is issued it cannot serve another foreigner.

What the file costs beyond the price

The costs beyond the price fall into the State’s charges and the file’s own costs. The title-deed fee is 20 per thousand charged to the transferor and 20 per thousand to the transferee (Law on Fees No. 492, tariff 4, item 20/a), on the declared price and never below the municipal value. VAT is a separate question: a first delivery of a newly built home or workplace is exempt when the buyer is a foreigner not settled in Türkiye and the price is brought in foreign currency (VAT Law No. 3065, Article 13(i)), and if that property is sold within three years the untaxed VAT is paid back with deferral interest before the deed moves. Beside these sit the valuation report, ordered through Web Tapu from a valuation firm the Capital Markets Board has authorized and priced by that firm, the sworn translations and notarizations of the family documents, and the residence permit charges. The USD 400,000 itself is not a fee: it buys an asset the buyer owns and may sell once the three years run.

Sequence of the file

• Tax number, then a Turkish bank account in the buyer’s name.
• Property selection, title registry search, valuation report by an SPK-authorized valuation firm requested through Web Tapu.
• Purchase and transfer at the Land Registry, with the three-year non-sale annotation entered on the title deed.
• Certificate of Conformity from the Ministry of Environment, Urbanisation and Climate Change, which is the authority that determines this route. Each route has a different one, which is why a certificate obtained for the wrong route is not a delay but a restart: the deposit route is determined by the BDDK, fund units by the Capital Markets Board, government debt instruments by the Ministry of Treasury and Finance, the private pension by the SEDDK, fixed capital by the Ministry of Industry and Technology, and the fifty employee route by the Ministry of Labour and Social Security.
• Short-term residence permit on the basis of the investment, issued under Article 31(1)(j) of Law No. 6458, which is the provision the citizenship article itself points to.
• Citizenship application at the governorate (valilik) of residence, made by the investor in person: Article 64(1) of the Regulation allows a special power of attorney, but the Directorate General of Civil Registration and Citizenship Affairs requires the foreigner to file himself (its citizenship FAQ), and fingerprints are taken; the lawyer prepares and follows the file. Every step between these appearances is ours first: the tax number, the bank and title-deed appointments, the forms, and the Turkish translations of the family documents, which we make and put to a sworn translator for checking and approval; a step passes to the investor only where we cannot take it, with the reason.

Where these files fail

• Payment made before the title registry search, when the deed already carries a mortgage or an injunction annotation.
• A valuation that does not reach the threshold, or a TTB more than twelve months older than the application for the citizenship transaction.
• An incomplete DAB, or a payment chain that does not link the buyer to the seller and to the specific property.
• Off-plan units whose construction status does not allow the annotation to be registered in time.
• Family documents that contradict each other in name spelling, date of birth or marital status.

Frequently asked

How long must the property be held? Three years. The annotation on the title deed records that undertaking.

Do I lose citizenship if I sell after three years? Not by the sale itself: once the three-year period has run, the undertaking on the deed has done its work. One transfer is the exception the Land Registry’s guide names: if the unit is put under a promise to sell during the undertaking, or transferred after it to its previous owner or to his first-degree relatives by marriage or blood, the investment certificate (TYTB) the citizenship file rested on is cancelled (the guide annexed to circular 2024/4, the parties’ item 8).

Are my family included? Yes: the spouse and the children who are under 18 or dependent, under Article 12(b) of Law No. 5901; a child who has come of age joins as a dependant, on documents assembled before filing.

Do I have to come to Turkey? Yes. The purchase and the steps between the appointments run under a special power of attorney, and there is no residence requirement and no language exam on this route, but the investor comes in person for the four steps the Directorate General of Civil Registration and Citizenship Affairs requires of him, the Certificate of Conformity, the short-term residence application, the residence card and the citizenship application, giving fingerprints at the two applications.

What is the title deed tax and who pays it? The title-deed fee (tapu harcı) is 20 per thousand for each party under the Law on Fees No. 492, tariff (4), item I-20/a, whose own wording is that it is charged separately for the transferor and the transferee. That is 40 per thousand across the transaction as a whole. The base is the declared transfer price and is never below the municipal property value. Which side actually bears it is contractual and the tariff does not assign it, so it is settled in the contract rather than by law.

How long does it take? On our files of 2019 to 2021, three to four months on a well prepared file. In 2026 the security and archive research has kept many files waiting well beyond four months, and decisions have come in batches, so no date can be promised; what a complete file avoids is the extra rounds of requests that add to it.

Official sources

• Directorate General of Civil Registration and Citizenship Affairs (NVI), for the citizenship procedure and the required documents.
• General Directorate of Land Registry and Cadastre (TKGM), for title deed, annotation and registry procedure.
• Official Gazette, for the regulation text and any change to the threshold.

The 400,000 USD figure was set by the amendment published in the Official Gazette of 13 May 2022, number 31834. The most recent change anywhere in Article 20 is dated 12 December 2023, Official Gazette 32397, and it redefined which property types qualify under this route rather than moving the figure. These sources set the framework. They do not confirm the acceptance of an individual file, and no outcome can be guaranteed. The amount is measured at the Central Bank rate on the date the authority determines the investment (Article 20(6) of the Implementing Regulation).

Related routes and next step

If the real estate route does not fit your file, there are six others. Article 20/2 letters (a) to (f) also cover a 500,000 USD bank deposit, government debt instruments, real estate or venture capital fund units and a private pension contribution at the same figure, on each of which the money first passes the Turkish bank’s source-of-funds check, plus fixed capital and the 50 employee route, both of which sit outside the currency sale chain entirely. The service overview is on our citizenship by investment practice page.

Once we are instructed, the file opens on the title deed, the draft contract, the valuation report and your passport details. Whether this home or plot can carry a citizenship application turns on the seller’s status and on the title, and both have to be read before any money moves and before a deposit binds you.

General information, not legal advice. Turkish law; verify your specific situation with a qualified lawyer.