Buying in London is not buying at home with the words changed. Most of the process translates; five things do not, and those five are where confident buyers still get caught. None of this is a warning against buying. It is the list we wish everyone had before the first viewing.
Each of these is something a UK-resident buyer would never have to think about, which is exactly why they are easy to miss when you are reading advice written for that buyer.
Stamp duty is not one rate. On top of the standard bands, surcharges can apply for buyers who are not UK resident and for buyers who already own another property anywhere in the world, including one in Turkey.
The second point is the one that surprises people. A flat you own at home can change what you pay here, and it is your worldwide position that counts rather than your UK one.
At home the tax follows the property. Here part of it follows you.
An off-plan purchase is usually paid in stages over a long period. Each stage converts at whatever rate applies on that day, so the total in your own currency is not knowable when you reserve.
This is not a reason to avoid buying, and it is not something anyone can forecast for you. It is a reason to size the purchase so that the plan still works if the rate moves against you, rather than only if it moves your way.
One price, one currency, one moment. Here the price is fixed in pounds and moves in lira.
Most London flats are sold leasehold: you own the home for a long fixed term rather than owning the ground beneath it outright. It is a normal and well-understood arrangement here, but it is not the same thing as the ownership most Turkish buyers picture.
What matters is the detail: how many years remain, what the service charge is and what it covers, and what the building’s safety documentation says. These vary far more between two buildings than between two areas.
Kat mülkiyeti gives you the freehold share. A lease gives you a long, defined term with its own conditions.
You will be asked to prove your identity and to document where your money came from, by us, by the developer, by your solicitor and by any lender. Each of them has a separate legal obligation and none can rely on another’s work.
This is not suspicion directed at you, and it is not negotiable by relationship. Buyers who assemble the documents early treat it as an administrative task; buyers who leave it are the ones who run out of time.
A trusted introduction can move things at home. Here it moves nothing without the paperwork behind it.
The reservation period does not get longer because you are in Istanbul, and neither does the exchange date. Viewings can be done remotely and documents can usually be signed at distance, but the clock is the same clock.
The practical answer is to solve the distance problems before they are urgent: agree early how documents will be signed and certified, and ask what your solicitor will need from you in person, if anything.
You can usually attend in person at short notice. Here the same errand is a flight or a notary.
Two of the five touch subjects that are regulated, so it is worth being exact about what you have just read.
We work in both languages, and the difficult parts are usually easier to think through in your own.
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