Industry-University Collaboration: BETAM and sahibinden.com Join Forces

Bahçeşehir University Economic and Social Research Center (BETAM) and sahibinden.com signed a collaboration to provide statistical data for monitoring developments in the real estate market and to guide property buyers, sellers and real estate professionals; the first "Housing Market Outlook" report prepared as a result has been published.

The first "Housing Market Outlook" report, prepared in collaboration between Bahçeşehir University Economic and Social Research Center (BETAM) and sahibinden.com, points to the important role of low-interest housing loans in the revival of the housing market.

REAL ESTATE IS ONE OF THE MOST ACTIVE CATEGORIES

Nazım Erdoğan, Deputy General Manager Responsible for Marketing at sahibinden.com, noted that the real estate category is one of the most active categories of the platform, which reaches 62.7 million users a month, and said: "In addition to our Emlak360 service, which we offer to support users visiting our platform to buy, sell or rent housing in their decision-making, we have entered into a new collaboration for our monthly Real Estate Index study. Thanks to our collaboration with BETAM, every month from January 2021, we will monitor developments in the real estate market more closely on a regional and provincial basis and make a qualified contribution to the evaluation of data in the sector."

BETAM Director Prof. Dr. Seyfettin Gürsel said:

"BETAM has been operating since February 2008 with the aim of establishing a well-rooted tradition of scientific research in Türkiye and becoming a research platform recognized and consulted in this field both at home and abroad. With the expertise of our valuable researchers, we have produced a study that will inform and guide the public on the real estate sector. Our first study covers the changes since 2017. Updated every month after January, the report will shed light on developments in current and real prices and sales volumes in the rental and for-sale housing markets."

BETAM ANALYZES THE DATA POOL

The report, prepared by analyzing the data pool of sahibinden.com's real estate category in collaboration with BETAM, covers developments in current and real prices of rental and for-sale housing listings and the lifetimes of listings removed from publication. The analyses were carried out for Türkiye as a whole, at the provincial level and separately for affordable and luxury housing.

The report examines the period from September 2017 to the end of December 2020. The first issue of the report, which will be shared regularly every month from now on, points to the important role of low-interest housing loans in the revival of the housing market.

SALE PRICES ROSE 50 PERCENT IN THE LAST THREE YEARS

Square meter prices in for-sale housing listings rose by 50 percent across Türkiye between September 2017 and December 2020. Among the three largest cities, the highest increase was seen in İzmir at 60 percent, while it was 50 percent in Ankara and 40 percent in Istanbul. Real sale prices, which declined from September 2017 until the pandemic period, began to rise last spring and the losses were largely recovered.

In December 2020, sale prices in housing listings rose by 34.2 percent compared with the same month of the previous year. As a result, the listing price per square meter of for-sale housing rose from 2,624 TL in December 2019 to 3,521 TL in December 2020.

Among the 30 metropolitan provinces, the provinces with the highest annual increases in current (listing) prices of for-sale housing in December 2020 were Mardin with 60.6 percent, Aydın with 57.1 percent, Diyarbakır with 55.3 percent, Muğla with 52.7 percent and Kahramanmaraş with 52.1 percent. The lowest increases were recorded in Trabzon, Kocaeli, Ordu, Istanbul and Tekirdağ, where price increases ranged between 24 and 30 percent.

The number of for-sale listings and of houses sold, which had remained flat until 2020, increased rapidly after the pandemic. The report revealed that the sharp rise in low-interest housing loans introduced during this period brought vitality to the for-sale housing market.

Although the listing sale prices of Affordable Housing and Luxury Housing as defined in the report rose below inflation from September 2017 to December 2020, the increase in luxury housing listing prices accelerated in recent months and caught up with inflation.

In December 2020, the average listing price per square meter was 1,922 TL for affordable housing and 10,585 TL for luxury housing. The low-interest housing loans that public banks began offering in June 2020 led to a very rapid recovery in the real prices of luxury housing, whereas affordable housing was not affected by the credit expansion as much as luxury housing.

- Rents and sale prices have been rising since 2017

According to the main findings of the report, rents have followed an upward trend since September 2017. Rental housing listing price data per square meter show that prices rose by 19 percent year on year in December 2020. The rental listing price per square meter, which was 12.9 TL in December 2019, rose to 15.4 TL in December 2020. Among the three largest cities, the highest rent increase over the past year was in Istanbul at 24 percent, followed by İzmir at 18 percent and Ankara at 10 percent.

Among the 30 metropolitan provinces, the highest increase in rental listing prices was recorded in Diyarbakır at 45.3 percent, while increases in Kahramanmaraş, Şanlıurfa, Mersin and Sakarya ranged between 33.7 and 38.6 percent. The lowest increases were seen in Van, Antalya, Ankara, Erzurum and Bursa, where annual rent increases in listings ranged between 5 and 13 percent.

The report notes that the number of rental listings began to rise with the start of the normalization process. The low-interest housing loan support introduced in June also brought vitality to the rental housing market, and the ratio of rented homes to the total number of rental homes rose to as high as 19 percent in the summer months, the highest point of the period.