buy apartment in Istanbul
buy apartment in Istanbul
It is time to go back to Istanbul. The city streets, which emptied after the military coup in 2016, are thronged with tourists again. In spite of the political situation, the city has managed to rediscover its colours and crowds.
And the Cihangir-Cukurcuma neighbourhoods where I have lived for the past 20 years are gradually coming to life. there are many houses for sale in Istanbul ,I’m pleased with these developments; it is gratifying to find that even in these dark days people from all over the world are still interested in you.
Istanbul houses weren’t as colourful in the Fifties as they are today. Back then no tourist would ever think of coming here. Cihangir was a predominantly Greek neighbourhood. In 1964, when Istanbul houses were driven out of the city in droves following the latest surge of tension between Greeks and Turks in Cyprus, the wide expanse of Cihangir Street was left to us kids to play football on. In the early Sixties, we lived in my mother’s fifth-floor apartments for sale in Turkey, and we used to light a stove to keep warm.
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Some 76 turkey real estate will introduce projects to Turks in Dusseldorf, Germany as part of the “My Home Turkey” real estate and investment fair supported by the Environment and Urbanization Ministry, Demirören Media and ISTexpo on Feb. 8-10.
For three days, participant companies will introduce special campaigns, payment methods and details of the projects on a 4,900-square-meter fair area.
The exposition is organized with Lineadecor’s partnership and Turkish Airlines’ official transportation sponsorship.
“Demirören Media has a special place in the industry with the news it reports on international platforms and media and the magazines and newspapers it publishes,” said Environment and Urbanization Minister Murat Kurum, conveying special thanks to Demirören Media for organizing the event.
“The fair is quite important to encourage our citizens in Europe to buy house in turkey and for being a platform on which our citizens residing in Europe can easily invest,” Kurum added.
Turkey’s Housing Development Administration (TOKİ) will also take part in the expo, according to the minister.
“Our expatriates purchasing real estate from Turkey will be beneficial to buy apartment in Istanbul as well as [their] homesickness,” said Şekib Avdagiç, the president of Istanbul Chamber of Commerce (ICOC).
He also said that 17 firms are participating in the event under ICOC, and demands from the real estate sector were so high that they had to widen the stand area to 400 square meters, almost 10 percent of the exposition area.
“In 60 years, expatriates will open new doors to their homeland. In some way, it will be a step toward reverse migration. This is the exposition in which investment is most desirable for our expatriates,” Avdagiç added.
According to figures Avdagiç provided, over 6 million Turks are residing overseas and at least 3 million of the number is in Germany.
More than 600,000 Turks are active in business in Germany, as Avdagiç said.
“This year, German tourists coming to Turkey is aimed to hit 5.6 million. It will not be a surprise than this attention will also be reflected in real estate. The exposition carries a lot of potential for our firms in this sense,” he added.
Avdagiç also stressed that in 2018, foreigners have purchased approximately 40,000 houses for sale in Istanbul.
In 2018, over 1,000 German citizens have bought property from Turkey.
“It is not tough to increase this figure to 10,000,” said Advagiç.
Apart from the 76 firms, the Association of Housing Developers and Investors, Association of Istanbul Constructors and Association of Real Estate and Real Estate Investment Companies will also participate to the exposition.
Many celebrities, including German-born Turkish football player Hamit Altıntop and German actress who has acted in several Turkish TV series Wilma Elles, will attend the fair.
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The scorpion’s legs flail mechanically as a current runs through its body. But the electrodes applied to its thorax and tail do their job. Three or four drops of clear liquid are extracted and caught in a tiny capsule.
“Very, very valuable liquid,” said Figen Caliskan, the biologist who runs this “scorpion house” at Turkey’s Eskisehir Osmangazi University. The powdered venom of her Arabian fat-tailed (androctonus crassicauda) scorpions is worth €13,000 to €19,000 a gramme. It is one of the most expensive materials in the world.
Dr Caliskan has studied scorpions and their sometimes deadly poison for decades. But two years ago she and her team were approached by a group of angel investors who wanted to harness their expertise to produce antivenom, with the aim of selling it across the Middle East and Africa, to treat people with life-threatening stings. The fledgling company that she works with, Albila, has received TL20m ($3.8m) in start-up capital from a group of 40 backers. The firm expects to turn its first profit within a year, and the investors hope to make a successful exit within four to seven years.
“We have very encouraging figures,” said Akin Kozanoglu, chairman of Sirket Ortagim, the investment management firm that is backing the project. Mr Kozanoglu, a former executive at the private lender Akbank, has also taken on the role of executive chairman at Albila, in order to share his experience with the firm.
Istanbul houses scene has expanded rapidly in recent years thanks to improved government incentives. In 2013, the country received €14.7m in angel investment, according to the European Trade Association for Business Angels. In 2017, the figure reached €52.3m — the fifth highest in Europe.
Elmira Bayrasli, a professor at New York’s Bard College who has championed angel investment in Turkey, said she was encouraged by the growth in science ventures, rather than simply more of the “e-commerce clones” that dominated the Turkish start-up landscape in its early years by copying the likes of eBay and Amazon.
“When you take a look at the top Turkish universities, these schools have really top-class minds and research institutions,” she said. “Angel investors are looking and saying: what are these geeks doing? Let’s work with them . . . they are opening up knowhow so that they can help brilliant scientists with great ideas.”
Albila was inspired by two brothers from the south-eastern town of Urfa, near Turkey’s border with Syria, who collect scorpions after nightfall using ultra-violet light.
Emine Sabanci Kamisli, a member of one of Turkey’s biggest business families and an investor in Sirket Ortagim’s projects, saw the brothers on television asking for help to harvest scorpions for sale. She took the idea of commercialising the venom to the firm and, after conducting feasibility studies and pairing up with the lab in Eskisehir, halfway between Istanbul and Ankara, they established Albila. The two brothers were each given a stake in the company.
Dr Caliskan’s team extract the venom from their 2,000 scorpions by hand, “milking” them one-by-one using home-made electrode pincers. The venom is dispatched to a nearby equestrian school that houses a group of horses owned by Albila. Over a period of months, they are injected with the venom, and their immune systems begin to produce antivenom. Plasma is then taken from the horses and delivered to the Albila laboratory, where it is tested and refined by scientists, who turn it into a certifiable medical product. The first vial of antivenom should be ready to buy apartment in Istanbul the next few months.
The company has launched at a difficult time for Turkey, which faces a sharp economic slowdown after its recent currency crisis.
Figen Caliskan and her team extract the venom from their 2,000 scorpions by hand, ‘milking’ them one-by-one using home-made electrode pincers
Albila was lucky to have secured its funding before the fluctuations in the lira. But now the company is well placed to take advantage of the weaker currency, with plans to export 75 per cent of its products overseas.
Foreign direct investment into Turkey has been sluggish, with the country attracting half the amount of FDI in 2017 that it did in 2007, when it drew a record $22bn. Some universities and companies are struggling with a brain drain to Europe and North America. But Mr Kozanoglu sees cause for optimism, with an growing entrepreneurial mindset among many of the country’s young people.
“Twenty or 30 years ago, university students would ask: when I graduate, what company will I work for? Now a good percentage are asking: what sort of business should I be doing?
“This will bring creativity, employment, and other value to the economy. It’s a very important change.”
Dr Caliskan said that working with the private sector had been a “dream” for her and her team at the scorpion house. “As researchers, we find many interesting things,” she said. “But if industry isn’t interested, our results have no meaning. Our motto is: from the academy to the economy.”
