Emlak Konut plans to rake up Turkey’s property market

ISTANBUL

Turkey’s real estate investment trust Emlak Konut GYO is poised to put about 35,000 houses on the market starting from the final quarter of this year, its CEO has said.

“We are planning to start selling [houses of] 12 new projects in Istanbul in the final quarter of this year,” daily Hürriyet quoted Hakan Gedikli as saying on Sept. 25.

The projects are carried out in the European side districts of Başakşehir, Küçükçekmece, Sarıyer, Avcılar, as well as in the Asian side districts of Çekmeköy and Kartal, he said.

Construction works will continue uninterruptedly next year, he added.

“We will put up for sale 15,000 separate units that have been designed in accordance with our customers’ needs until the end of this year. In addition, we are aiming at launching 20,000 separate units by the end of 2022 after developing lands in our portfolio,” said Gedikli.

He expected that other real estate developers will be stimulated by Emlak Konut’s move to offer new houses.

Slightly more than 49 percent of Emlak Konut’s shares are owned by the Housing Development Administration of Turkey (TOKİ), while the rest of the shares is publicly held.

Expecting a total amount of nearly $7.5 billion in sales to foreigners this year, the Turkish property market ranks among the top 10 in the world.

Turkey recorded 141,400 housing sales in August, down 17 percent on an annual basis.

Istanbul had the biggest share with 24,286 units, according to official figures announced by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK).

The capital Ankara and the Aegean province of İzmir followed Istanbul with 13,642 and 7,731 units, respectively.
A total of 7,106 houses were sold for the first time, while second-hand housing sales totaled 20,269 units.

Mortgaged housing sales were recorded at 27,375, down 64% compared to the same period last year.

In August, 5,866 houses were sold to foreigners, marking a 50.7 percent rise year on year.