Tens of thousands of households rushed on Wednesday to apply for Türkiye’s biggest ever social housing project that seeks to make many low-income families homeowners amid soaring real estate prices and rents.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan unveiled plans to build 500,000 new homes and 50,000 offices over five years from 2023 through 2025 in what he dubbed the country’s largest ever home-ownership drive. The project also includes 250,000 land plots that will be sold to qualifying applicants.
Households flocked online on Wednesday to apply for the campaign, which Erdoğan said will prioritize pensioners, young people, newly married, veterans, relatives of martyrs and the disabled. Applications began on Wednesday and will last through the end of October.
About 225,000 applications were made by noon on Wednesday, Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change Minister Murat Kurum said.
The project will be run by the state-run housing agency TOKI, which Kurum said had built some 1.17 million houses in the last 20 years.
Of the units in the first stage, 50,000 will be allocated in Istanbul, 18,000 in Ankara, 12,000 in the Aegean province of Izmir and 10,000 in the southeastern province of Gaziantep.
Some 240,000 housing units, 100,000 plots and 10,000 offices are planned to be built and delivered across Türkiye’s 81 provinces in the first stage, Kurum told a meeting in Istanbul on Wednesday.
The project will offer properties at affordable interest rates, prices and payment plans. The government will extend the repayment period to 20 years to keep monthly payments at as low as $125 (TL 2,280), according to the plan.
There will be an income cap on eligibility for applying for the project. Households with an income below TL 18,000 in Istanbul and TL 16,000 in other provinces and those who are not currently homeowners are able to apply.
The government had pledged to act as residents struggle to find affordable homes to rent or buy, and soaring prices triggered alarm. Prices and rents have more than doubled over the last year across the country, and even more in the largest cities.
In the country’s largest city Istanbul, home to around a fifth of Türkiye’s population of 85 million, the residential property price index (RPPI) climbed 185% year-over-year in June in nominal terms. The rise in Ankara was 165%, while prices in Izmir, the third largest city, rocketed 151% on an annual basis.
"The biggest reason why we are engaged day and night for this country and nation is our great potential. With this understanding, under the leadership of our president, we have always seen the right to housing, which is the basic duty of the welfare state, and social housing among our priorities for 20 years," Kurum said.
Some 5% of homes, or 12,500, will be allocated for veterans and relatives of martyrs, a figure that will also apply to disabled households, the minister said. A 50,000 quota each will be allocated for pensioners and youth.
"With these projects, we will increase the number of houses that have reached 1.17 million in 20 years to 2 million when we come to 2028. The number of our citizens owning a house will have reached approximately 10 million," Kurum said.
The project will have a total investment value of around TL 900 billion, Erdoğan said on Tuesday. "With the multiplier effect, the economic impact of this project is TL 2 trillion. Such an investment will reduce housing prices and rents and make it easier for citizens to own a house," he noted.
The first stage amounts to TL 422 billion, Kurum said. He also noted that Erdoğan ordered that 40% of the total cost be made through government subsidies.