Nearly 1.5 million homes sold last year, up 21 percent
ANKARA

Some 1.48 million homes changed hands in Türkiye last year, marking a robust 20.6 percent increase compared to 2023, according to data the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK) released on Jan. 21.
In December alone, the housing market expanded by 53.4 percent year-on-year with 212,637 homes sold. Home sales recorded double-digit annual growth rates between July and December 2024, hitting as high as 76 percent in October and 64 percent in November.
Mortgaged homes sales were down 10.8 percent in 2024 from 2023 to 158,486 units. However, mortgage homes sales skyrocketed 285 percent year-on-year in the final month of last year to 23,277, showed TÜİK data.
There are a couple of reasons why people have been buying homes in the last couple of months, according to experts.
The decline in home prices in real terms, the anticipation that home prices will start to pick up as lower interest rates will rekindle demand for properties, which will eventually lead to higher prices, say experts.
The residential property index rose by 29.4 percent in December from a year ago. The index, however, declined by 10.4 percent year-on-year in the month in real terms, the Central Bank announced earlier this month.
The Central Bank launched the easing cycle in December by lowering its policy rate — one-week repo auction rate — from 50 percent to 47.5 percent in a move that marked the first cut in nearly two years as inflation continued to slow.
The bank is expected to deliver another 250bps cut this week when its Monetary Policy Committee meets on Jan. 23.
Istanbul remained the hottest property market last year when 239,213 residential properties were sold in the mega city. The capital Ankara came second at more than 136,000 homes sold, followed by the western province of İzmir at 80,398.
Despite the strong rebound in the housing market last year, homes sales to foreign nationals were poor.
In 2024, foreigners bought a total of 23,781 residential properties in Türkiye, a 32.1 percent decline from the previous year.
The share of homes sales to foreigners in total remained at 1.6 percent, said TÜİK.
Russians were the largest buyers at 4,867, followed by Iranians at 2,166 and Ukrainians at 1,631.
Istanbul was also the favored destination of foreign homebuyers. Last year, 8,416 homes were sold to foreign nationals in the city.
In Antalya, which is home to large Russian and Ukrainian populations, foreigners bought 8,223 homes. The southern province of Mersin ranked third at 2,112.