According to TurkStat housing sales statistics, the Chinese continue to show interest in housing purchases in Turkey this year. The Chinese entered the list of the citizens of the top 20 countries that buy the most houses from Turkey according to their nationalities. The Chinese ranked 16th in 2016 with 281 houses and 18th in 2015 with 271 houses.
The Chinese entered the list of foreigners buying houses from Turkey this year despite the pandemic. They were not in the list for the last 3 years; and yet broke the all-time record in housings sales with 659 units in Jan-Sept period. Accordingly, Chinese become the 12th most house purchasing nationality this year.
Lebanese bought 650 housings in 2019 and ranked 20th in the last year’s list which did not include Chinese.
‘’The Chinese made an annual investment of $50 billion on foreign real estate.’’
Omer Faruk Akbal the president of Real Estate Overseas Promotion Association (GIGDER) stated that the Chinese are more likely to have bought residences for Turkish citizenship and said:
‘’We are just at the beginning; we are far below our current potential. We are globally positioned at the Silk Road; we expect more Chinese to come to our country.’’
Akbal also talked about the historical past of China and Turkey and reminded that the trade relations of these two countries date back to old times. He said:
‘’Kusak and Yol Projects reanimated the Silk Road. The annual overseas real estate investment of the Chinese is over $50 billion. If we follow the right strategy, we have the potential to get a big share of this cake. We can become a country within easy reach of Chinese industrialists, corporate real estate investors and real buyers.’’
‘’Turkish estate products will be introduced in China after the pandemic.’’
Referring to the international road maps for the promotion of Turkish real estate products, Akbal said:
‘’If Turkey carries out marketing activities in a systematic way with a corporate governance, it could be an important option for Chinese investors. The satisfaction is important at this point.
As GIGDER, we plan to organize various promotional activities and fair organizations with the participants of our sector representatives in important cities of China after the pandemic. It is very important for our companies to carry out more effective promotional activities in China and to support these organizations with incentive mechanisms provided by the public. In addition, China should definitely be added to the representative offices to be opened in 12 countries abroad by the General Directorate of Land Registry and Cadastre.’’
‘’Our country has begun to become attractive to the Chinese.’’
Selman Ozgun the Foreign Investments Council Member of Foreign Economic Relations Board (DEIK) stated that the number of Chinese visitors to Turkey has increased in the recent years, 500 thousand Chinese tourists came to Turkey last year and that their aim is to increase this number to 1 million. He said:
‘’Increasing number of Chinese tourists, economic relations, Turkey’s current location and to be seen as one of the European countries began to make our country attractive for real estate investment in Chinese eyes.
The Chinese bought the most housings from Istanbul. They also interested in Ankara and Antalya. I believe that focusing on China in international promotions will raise the sales figures much higher. The Chinese are very interested in the reanimation of the Silk Road; they increase their investments on Turkey which is one of the most important junctions of Silk Road.
Chinese investments on Turkey have exceeded $15 billion. There has been a 120 percent increase in these investments in the last 5 years. The number of companies originated in China exceeded thousand. It is expected that these investments will be doubled. The Chinese care about port cities such as Istanbul, Mersin, Bursa and Antalya due to the Iron Silk Road, and they focus on logistics, health, tourism and agriculture investments as well as real estate. The Chinese are looking for alternative living centres and Turkey is attractive from every angle.’’
‘’The demand will increase in the near future.’’
Abdulkadir Akkus the board chairman of Akkus Estate stated that the fact that 2019 was declared as ‘’Turkish Year’’ in China and the promotional activities in EXPO 2019 held in Beijing are effective in the recent demand. He said:
‘’ Turkey’s successful fight against the pandemic also affects investment decisions. Even though we are in a pandemic period, Chinese are interested in investing in Turkey. We can say that demand will be more in the upcoming period.’’
Akkus added that in the new period, expanding promotional activities and increasing the cooperation of governments and NGOs will make investment in the sector even more attractive.
‘’The demand is not only from China but also from Asia and Europe.’’
Selcuk Celik, the member of Nef executive board stated that the estate demand is not only from China but also from Asia and Europe and said:
‘’China has now begun to appear on the list. The number of residences the Chinese buy at the end of the year may exceeded thousand. The rapid acceleration of China, which was not included in the top 20 before, despite the pandemic this year, indicates the future potential of our country, its experience in the housing sector and its investment value.’’
Celik emphasized Turkish estate sector has a long way to develop despite these number and said:
‘’$78 billion of housing was sold to foreigners in the USA last year, $13.4 billion of these were bought by the Chinese. China is in the top 5 estate purchasing in countries such as Portugal and Spain, also has 13 thousand 75 residents in Greece. Chinese increased the demand towards Turkey by 110 percent compared to 2019. We need to increase the demand by promotion and marketing.’’
source: AA / translated by Melisa Karayusufoglu