Unregistered owners spend 7 billion Turkish liras to buy land
ANKARA – Anadolu Agency
DHA Photo
Squatters on unregistered plots of land have paid 7 billion Turkish Liras ($2.9 billion) to the Turkish Treasury to register their ownership in the past year, the Turkish Finance Ministry said Feb. 17.The plots of land, officially referred to as “2B,” were formerly classified as a forest where construction and agricultural activity were banned.
Migrants settled as squatters on this land, without ever registering ownership or paying rent to the state. They used the land as farms, grazing meadows, graveyards and housing.
After the new law approved by parliament in 2012, this land became eligible for construction. Under the new law, the 872,336 residents needed to pay 70 percent of the land’s current value.
“We have finalized the sale of 2B lands to 514,383 of the 721,541 people who applied to purchase these properties as of Jan. 30,” Finance Minister Mehmet Şimşek said.
There are some 4.1 million acres of 2B lands across the country. Almost 90 percent of the land is located in Turkey’s coastal provinces of Antalya, Istanbul, Mersin, Muğla and Sakarya.
The country’s holiday resort Antalya has completed the largest sale, Şimşek said.
“This ongoing issue has been resolved with the practice of sales and Turkey has benefitted from the sales,” he s
