ger720

hi
does anyone had their tapu with a different price showing what they have paid...wepaid €40000 euro but it seems to show 35000lira which when converted to euro is only around half of what we paid...our agents(turkish property centre) says this is the amount of cost which was taxed or taxed paid by builder!!
As its in turkish it is difficult to understand.
confused!!!

Terry&Sue

Yes our Tapu shows 47000 which was what we paid in sterling but it has YTL written beside it which is less than half the value.
We have like you been told not to worry about it but will check again with the Tapu office when we are out in May.

JohnF

As your place is in Fethiye, this figure is set by the council based on location, internal & external dimensions and I suspect some other unknown factors. Nothing to worry about.

JF

neutral

Is this the same for Gumbet/Bodrum as our Tapu shows just under half what we paid ?
QUOTE


As your place is in Fethiye, this figure is set by the council based on location, internal & external dimensions and I suspect some other unknown factors. Nothing to worry about.

Thanks,
Dave

JohnF

Don't know, but suspect it will be. Maybe someone from that area could confirm?

JF

earlybird

As I've been told/heard in past, this is common practice in Turkey - its to avoid tax. If new build you will probably find that the builder had a much lower price on the tapu when he bought the land/building, if he puts the true price on the tapu that he sold for he would be responsible for taxation of the differing amounts. Therefore they put a lower amount and therefore do not pay as much tax.

JohnF

Putting the tax issue to one side - in the Fethiye area it is the local belediye who set the prices, not the buyer/seller. I was concerned about a property we bought a couple of years ago where the Tapu valuation was literally pennies, and was told by both the belediye and my solicitor that it was fine, it was an official valuation. I haven't seen the correspondence, but I'm fairly sure our solicitor has all this in writing.

I suspect the tax issue arises where builders use the council valuations as part of their tax returns, instead of using the purchase price which they should.

JF

lozengelegend

The reason the prices are different is because it was common practice to declare the council/belediye's average valuation on the tapu - as with John F. The way for the belediye to judge the average property sales price was totally inefficient (based on the tapu! bit circular, that!) and also only updated once every few years. You pay your buying tax based on a percentage of the DECLARED value on the tapu even if the actual sales price is different.

Now in areas where true purchase prices have risen a lot, like Fethiye, there is a huge discrepancy between the actual amounts of money changing hands and the amount of tax coming in.

What I read in Today's Zaman is that the authorities are cracking down on this, particularly in Fethiye. But the article is no longer online so whether it's inaccurate or they pulled it for another reason I don't know!

What I do say, as an estate agent myself, is that while we have received no notice that you shouldn't declare the belediye value on your tapu, the Office of the First Economic Counsellor's website (ie Turkish embassy in London) say pretty darn clearly that you should ONLY declare the actual value - so my advice is ONLY DECLARE THE ACTUAL VALUE!
http://www.turkisheconomy.org.uk/bu..._taxevasion.htm

They also imply they are trying to find out if you have previously underdeclared the value of your property and that you should come clean now if you have.

I have worked in the estate agency business here for several years and have witnessed competent, professional and honest lawyers (yes, they exist!) advising customers to declare the belediye value on their tapu and I find it hard to believe that they were deliberately misleading their customers! Also, if it was previously illegal to declare the belediye valuation on your tapu, why was this not part of the estate agency licensing course required to operate as an agent here in Didim?!

If there are any property lawyers online, perhaps you can give your opinion!

So on retrospectively declaring the true price of your property I have no recommendation. If the authorities have only belatedly realised this loophole it seems a bit unfair to retrospectively punish people who used it in good faith.

JohnF

I think we've already established that the info from that particular web site should only be used as a guide, way too many inaccuracies and very often their advice bears no relation to what actually happens locally (in Turkey).

According to a couple of estate agents I know in the Fethiye area, it would be nigh on impossible to declare the sale price as the belediye consider their valuation to be the true valuation. And if the belediye say its right... who is going to argue on the day their property sale is going through?

The point a few folks have missed in previous threads is that you do not need to give the Tapu valuation when completing a tax return. You can give the true purchase price corroborating it with your sales contract, although (on a new build) if a developer has priced your property at Tapu rate and the taxman ties the transactions up, you could safely say that the cat would be amongst the pidgeons...

JF