As per the Turkish Land Registry's requirements, foreign individuals applying for real estate investment immigration must provide a property appraisal report to confirm if the property's value meets the citizenship requirements. Unlike Greece, Turkey's investment threshold is not solely based on the property's sale price; it also requires the property's actual appraised value to exceed a specified amount.

In the initial stages of the project, there were instances where the assessed value in some property appraisal reports did not align with the actual appraised value. For example, some developers sold properties with actual appraised values below $250,000 to investors. By collaborating with local appraisal agencies, they "adjusted" the property's appraised value to meet the immigration application requirements.

With the increase in such irregularities, the Turkish Land Registry gradually strengthened the scrutiny of property appraisal reports. It revoked business licenses for some entities issuing false appraisal reports and even annulled some citizenship applications processed through these illegal means.

To standardize the behavior of appraisal agencies in the market, prevent false appraisals, and promote the healthy development of the local real estate transaction market, Turkey's Land Registry established a dedicated Property Appraisal Department in 2021. Qualified appraisal institutions formed appraisal teams to unify and improve appraisal standards, and an online appraisal system was introduced, officially launched in September 2021.

The launch of the Property Appraisal System implies that investors can no longer independently choose appraisal agencies. All appraisal work must be completed at institutions designated by the system to ensure greater objectivity, fairness, and strictness in the appraisal process.

Given the high volume of real estate transactions in Turkey, the Land Registry has a vast amount of sample property appraisal reports and transaction information. The system automatically compares data for the same or similar property projects, scrutinizing both sales and appraisal prices. Any significant discrepancies with existing data in the system attract the attention of relevant personnel.

Especially in the resale of properties, which were not advantageous in appraisals initially, the introduction of this system, coupled with the inability to independently choose appraisal agencies and increasingly stringent appraisal standards, will make it more challenging to meet appraisal requirements. Due to this, we consistently advise investors to avoid selecting resale properties when making purchases to prevent later complications in meeting appraisal requirements.

On November 22, 2023, the Turkish Land Registry updated the announcement regarding property value appraisal reports, further standardizing real estate appraisal procedures, including technical and procedural aspects of valuation.