🛑 A client obtained Turkish citizenship by purchasing an apartment in 2023. In September 2026, he asked me if he should be worried. The answer depended on a single document he had never seen.
The situation: Citizenship was processed by a "turnkey" intermediary: they found a property, conducted the appraisal, managed the transaction, and submitted documents. The client paid, received passports for his family, and forgot about it. Then came the news: the state annulled the citizenship of over six thousand people for fictitious real estate transactions. How the scheme worked and what the audit revealed is discussed on a website, link at the end.
Where it breaks: In these transactions, the property was valued at a third of its appraised price, and crucially, the buyer's money never actually entered Turkey; the intermediary used their own funds. The buyer sincerely believed they had bought an apartment for 400 thousand because that's what they paid the intermediary. Now, decisions are being retroactively revoked, and families, along with the investor, are losing their status.
What was checked: Three documents are critical: the bank trace, showing that your specific money from your foreign account reached the seller; the appraisal versus real prices in the area on the transaction date; and the seller's connection to the intermediary. For this client, everything is clean; we've compiled a dossier into one file in case of inquiry. For two other clients, the intermediary brought in currency from their own accounts, and we are preparing our position pending notification.
Conclusion: Citizenship bought "turnkey" has turned into an asset that needs to be verified, not a status that can be forgotten. The state looks not at the passport, but at the money trail in a three-year-old transaction. If you haven't seen the currency purchase certificate for your transaction, you don't know what you signed.
Did you obtain citizenship through real estate in 2022-2025? Contact us, and we will check your dossier against the three key points.