Kamulaştırma: What Happens If the State Expropriates Your Turkish Property
Turkey can compulsorily acquire private property for public purposes — but the procedure is tightly scripted, the deadlines are short, and the law gives the owner rights that lapse if nobody uses them.
Compulsory purchase, with a procedure attached
Kamulaştırma is the compulsory acquisition of private property by the state for a public purpose — a road widening, a metro line, a dam, a school. What foreign owners tend not to realise is how much of Turkish expropriation law is procedural, and how much of that procedure runs on deadlines that count against the owner.
The governing statute is the Expropriation Law, No. 2942, adopted on 4 November 1983 and published in the Official Gazette on 8 November 1983, issue 18215. It has been amended substantially since, most importantly by Law No. 4650 in 2001.
The single most useful thing to understand is that the law does not begin with a court. It begins with an offer: an administration that wants your property must try to buy it from you first, and only if that fails does the matter go before a judge. Owners who treat the first letter as junk mail lose the part of the process where they had the most influence.
For a non-resident owner there is a trap in that. The clocks start when notice is served or, where the owner cannot be found, when the court publishes an announcement in the press. If your details at the land registry are out of date, the deadlines can run while you know nothing about it. Keeping them current is the mechanism by which you find out in time to act.
Expropriation at a Glance
The provisions and periods that matter
How an expropriation actually unfolds
Seven stages, in statutory order. Stages three and four are where an owner has real leverage; stage six is where it is lost if the deadline passes.
The expropriation decision
A public administration decides it needs the property and takes a formal expropriation decision. Everything downstream depends on that decision having been validly taken and the property genuinely serving the stated public purpose — which is what an annulment action attacks.
Valuation and settlement commissions are formed
The administration appoints one or more valuation commissions (kıymet takdir komisyonu) of at least three of its own staff to estimate the price on the Article 11 criteria, taking expert reports and, where needed, information from chambers of commerce and local agencies. It separately appoints settlement commissions (uzlaşma komisyonu), also of at least three, to negotiate.
The offer letter arrives
The administration notifies the owner by official registered letter that it wishes to acquire the property by negotiation or by swap. Note one deliberate feature: the letter does نه state the price the commission arrived at. You are invited to negotiate without being shown the other side’s number.
You have fifteen days to come forward
Article 8 gives the owner or an authorised representative fifteen days from service to apply asking to sell or swap by agreement. Miss it and the negotiated route closes. It is the shortest and most consequential deadline in the process, and the one a non-resident owner is likeliest to miss.
Negotiation, and the agreement minutes
The commission sets a date and negotiations take place, with any agreed figure capped at the estimated value already determined. If terms are agreed, minutes are drawn up recording the property's characteristics, the price and the owner's consent — and those minutes count as the owner's conveyance declaration and the legal basis for registration.
Or the matter goes to court
If there is no agreement, Article 10 applies. The administration petitions the civil court of first instance (asliye hukuk mahkemesi) where the property is, asking it to determine the price and order registration against payment. The court sets a hearing no later than thirty days from the application and summons the owner, and the summons must spell out that within the Article 14 period the owner may bring an annulment action in the administrative court or a correction action in the civil court.
Payment, registration and the thirty-day challenge
Where terms were agreed, the administration must have the price ready within forty-five days of the minutes, and payment follows registration. On the court route the price is deposited in the bank named in the summons. The owner's thirty-day window to challenge runs from the court's notification — or, where they could not be served, from the newspaper announcement.
How the price is worked out — and what is deliberately left out
Valuation is where most expropriation disputes live, and Article 11 is unusually specific. The expert panel visits the site with the court, hears the parties present, and reports on a defined list of elements separately.
- The type, nature and area of the property.
- Every quality capable of affecting its value, each valued separately.
- The tax declaration, and any official valuations made by public authorities.
- For farmland, the net income it would produce if used as it is.
- For building plots, comparable sales before the expropriation date, excluding sales made for a special purpose.
- For buildings, official unit prices and construction costs, less depreciation.
- Other objective criteria, with the effect of each one explained.
Since a 2016 amendment the report must comply with the valuation standards accepted by Turkey’s Capital Markets Board. Under Article 15 the panel must have at least three members, one holding a master’s or doctorate in real estate development or licensed as a valuer under the capital markets legislation.
Where only part of your land is taken
Where an expropriation takes an easement rather than the property itself, Article 11 provides that the resulting reduction in value is itself the expropriation price, and the reasons for it must be stated. A transmission line crossing a plot is the classic case: you keep the land, and what you are paid for is what the burden has cost it.
Challenging it: two different courts, one deadline
Article 14 gives the owner thirty days. The choice of forum depends on what is actually wrong.
Annulment, in the administrative court
If the complaint is that the expropriation should not have happened at all — no valid public purpose, a defective decision, a procedural failure — that is an annulment action (iptal davası) in the administrative court, and Article 14 states these are heard as a priority.
Correction, in the civil court
If the complaint is a material error — wrong parcel, area or owner, an arithmetical mistake — that is a correction action (düzeltim davası) in the civil court. The administration has its own thirty-day window for the same remedy.
Two further points from Article 14 are easy to miss. Where property is jointly or commonly owned, each co-owner has an independent right to sue — one owner’s inaction does not bind the others. And if it emerges mid-proceedings that the true owner is somebody else, the case continues with that person joined, including heirs where the registered owner had died. If you have inherited Turkish property and never completed the registration, read how Turkish inheritance law treats property — an unresolved succession does not pause an expropriation.
One live change to watch
The law here is not static. A decision of the Turkish Constitutional Court dated 12 February 2026 annulled the phrase providing that the registration judgment under Article 10 is final, taking effect nine months after publication in the Official Gazette, on 21 February 2027. Anyone facing an expropriation around that date should take advice on what route of appeal is open to them.
The rights that come after — and expire
An expropriation is not necessarily the end of your relationship with the property. Law No. 2942 contains two mechanisms for getting it back, both governed by short periods that run whether or not the former owner is paying attention.
Abandonment by the administration (Article 22)
If, after the expropriation has become final, the property is no longer needed for the expropriation purpose or any public benefit, the administration notifies the former owner or their heirs under the Notification Law. They may take it back within three months by paying the price plus statutory interest from the day they received it, and no interest is charged where the return happens within one year of the expropriation becoming final. Two cut-offs apply: refusing to take it back under Article 22 also extinguishes the separate Article 23 right, and Article 22 does not apply once five years have passed since the expropriation became final.
The owner’s right of recovery (Article 23)
This is the provision few owners know about. If, within five years from the date the price became final, the administration does no work consistent with the expropriation purpose and does not allocate the property to any public need, leaving it as it was, the former owner or their heirs may take it back by paying the price plus statutory interest from the date they received it.
Urgent expropriation, and why the deed goes quiet
Article 27 provides a faster track. Where the President decides there is a national defence need or urgency under the National Defence Obligations Law No. 3634, or in extraordinary situations under special laws, the steps other than valuation are completed afterwards. The court has the value determined within seven days by experts selected under Article 15, the administration deposits that amount in the bank named in the summons in the owner’s name, and the property may then be seized.
A 2018 amendment added the part a buyer most needs to know. The seizure decision is notified to the land registry and an annotation is placed on the register recording that the property cannot be transferred, conveyed or assigned. The property is then vacated under Article 20.
Planned public works show up in a parcel’s zoning status long before any expropriation decision, and checking the imar durumu is how you see a road alignment or a public allocation crossing land you are about to buy. For plots in particular, what to check before buying land in Turkey covers the wider set of obligations that come with an undeveloped parcel.
Urban transformation is related but legally distinct, driven by building risk rather than public works and run under its own statute — see how kentsel dönüşüm works for how that differs.
What to do if a notification arrives
The deadlines in Law No. 2942 are short and they run from service. These are the moves that preserve your options rather than closing them.
Date-stamp everything
Record the date of service on every document as it arrives. The fifteen- and thirty-day periods run from service, or from newspaper publication where you could not be served. Almost every forfeited right here is a date nobody noted.
Get Turkish counsel immediately
Whether you need an annulment or a correction action, and which court hears it, turns on what is defective. Getting it wrong can cost the remedy. Working with a Turkish property lawyer sets out how instruction works from abroad.
Get your own valuation
The administration's estimate is made by its own commission and is not disclosed in the offer letter. An independent appraisal gives you something to negotiate against. How valuation reports work in Turkey explains who is licensed to produce one.
Engage within fifteen days
Applying within the Article 8 period keeps the negotiated route open. It does not commit you to a figure — it preserves the stage at which one can be discussed at all.
Read the register again
Pull the current land registry record. A seizure annotation under Article 27, or any entry added since you last looked, changes what you can still do with the property.
Diarise the recovery windows
If the expropriation completes, note the date the price became final. Article 23 turns on a five-year observation window and a one-year window to act — the right lapses if nobody uses it.
Three routes, three different positions
Which one you are in determines what you can still argue about.
| Negotiated purchase (Art. 8) | Court determination (Art. 10) | Urgent expropriation (Art. 27) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starts with | An offer letter to the owner | A petition to the civil court | A Presidential decision on urgency |
| Owner’s deadline | 15 days to apply | Evidence on value in 10 days; challenge in 30 | Driven by the court timetable |
| Price fixed by | Negotiation, capped at the commission estimate | The court, on an expert panel report | The court, within 7 days |
| Can you contest the price later | No — expressly barred | Yes, within the Article 14 period | Yes, valuation steps completed later |
| Property seized before price settled | نه | نه | Yes, on deposit of the determined amount |
| Annotation placed on the deed | Registration follows the agreement | Registration on the court’s order | Yes — no transfer permitted |
| Typical speed | Fastest | Slowest | Fast, by design |
The negotiated route is usually quickest and least costly, and that is bought by giving up the right to argue about the figure. Whether it is a good trade depends on whether the figure is defensible — which you cannot know without your own valuation.
Buying land or a plot in Turkey?
We pull the land registry record and the zoning status together, so a public allocation or a seizure annotation shows up before you commit rather than after.
سوالات متداول
Six questions owners and buyers ask about expropriation in Turkey.
Check the zoning and the register together
Expropriation risk is visible before you buy — in the zoning status of the parcel and on the encumbrances page of the title deed. We pull both, read them together, and tell you what a public allocation or a seizure annotation would mean for the property you are considering. We work with licensed Turkish lawyers and appraisers.
