According to data from the Revenues Administration (GİB) collected by the Anatolia news agency, the government’s efforts in 2009 to clamp down on unregistered real estate that is not taxed resulted in a substantial increase in rental income declarations by property owners.
The data show that in 2009, the number of property owners declaring rental income increased by more than 87,000 individuals for an increase in declared rental income of over TL 804 million. The total rental income declared in 2009 was TL 7.4 billion, significantly higher than the TL 6.6 billion declared in 2008. The number of property owners declaring rental income also increased to 812,600, up from 724,900 in 2008. The amount of tax revenue to the state deriving from rent was TL 1.5 billion in 2008 and TL 1.7 billion in 2009.
İstanbul was at the top of the list as 35 percent of all rental income came from this province, with Ankara and İzmir following.
Ankara Tax Office President Şinasi Candan, speaking to Anatolia, stated that his office is close to finishing up a project to identify property owners who had rental income and that they are going and identifying tenants one by one in order to identify which property owners are paying taxes on rental income. According to Candan, in March of this year alone they were able to identify an extra 22,000 property owners who were forced to declare rental income.
