Turkey's real estate
sector to pick up pace
The real estate
sector that went through two elections and foreign crisis in 2007 began
this year with great expectations. While January did not live up to
expectations, the rest of the year seems to be promising.
Ahmet
Rauf Saatçi, regional director of Turkey, Germany and the Balkans at
Century 21, a leading chain of real estate agencies both in Turkey and
abroad, said Turkey has potential in the real estate sector. Despite
this, the transactions in the sector have been worse than expected for
the last year and a half. “January is generally a stagnant month; the
activity starts from the end of February onward, especially during
spring,” added Saatçi, who expects more activity this year.
Saatçi
noted that the sector has been revitalized with new construction
projects that began at the end of 2007. "There has been an aggravating
mortgage turmoil in the United States and European countries along with
attempts to lower bank interest rates in order to diminish the effects
of this crisis," said Saatçi. "However, Turkey has not been affected by
these events. We have not formed the system yet. I expect more from
this year than 2007." He said that the apparent stagnation is seasonal
and that people expected the decrease of the dollar to impact the
market as well. “We can see serious rental transactions for the last
two months. It may be expected that the mortgage system will be see
brisk activity in Turkey after the global fluctuations stop and dollar
gains in value. The flux of global funds into the country will also
increase this activity,” Saatçi said.