Article 12 of the Turkish Citizenship Law No. 5901 allows foreign investors to acquire Turkish citizenship in exceptional terms; with Presidential Decree number 106 under date of 18.09.2018, amendatory new arrangements have been made regarding the amounts mentioned in the Article 20 of the Regulation on the Implementation of the aforementioned Law.

Within this scope, the foreign investors;

• who make fixed capital investment at least 500.000 US Dollars;
• who purchase the immovable property for at least 250.000 US Dollars and attaché annotation at land registration not to sell this property for three years;
• who employ at least 50 employees;
• who invest at least 500.000 US Dollars and make commitment to hold the amount of deposits for three years at banks operating in Turkey;
• who purchase public borrowing instruments for at least 500.000 US Dollars and hold these instruments for three years
• who purchase a real estate investment fund participation share or venture capital investment fund participation amount for at least 500.000 US Dollars and make commitment to hold these participation shares for three-years

Our law firm ”TUNCAY&BARCIN” have started operations to provide faster service. Moreover, the documents requested from foreign citizens to acquire residence permit in Turkey and the documents requested separately in citizenship applications were simplified in our office,  so residence permit and citizenship application shall be obtained at once together with the jointly determined documents.

Here I want to tell some details about the procedure of acquiring citizenship by purchasing property for an amount of at least 250.000 US Dollars since we receive many questions from our clients regarding this issue. Procedures starts from buying property at the land registry. At the land registry office we  attach an annotation not to sell this property for three years (which does not prevent it from being rented out). And after that we apply for the residence permit .When the residence permit document is issued, we apply to the Governor with our file. The experts of Ministry of Environment and Urbanization will make a valuation of the property. If the valuation report shows that the property’s value is 250.000 Dollars’ worth or more, the governor sends the file to the ministry of interior to issue the passport.

Finally, in my opinion, the new law will have many positive effects to our economy. With the new law, acquiring Turkish citizenship is more efficient and faster.  There are many investors contacting us about this law and also there are sales which have been done according to this new law.

Lawyer Fatih Barcın