How to Deal With a Tenant Who Does Not Pay Rent Under Turkish Law

If your tenant in Turkey has stopped paying rent, you must give them at least 30 days' written notice before you can sue to evict (Article 315 TBK), and since 1 September 2023 you must also complete mandatory mediation before filing most lease lawsuits. From there, Turkish law gives you two routes you can use together: enforcement proceedings to collect the unpaid rent, and an eviction lawsuit to recover possession. This guide walks a foreign owner through the deadlines, statutes and steps, including how the lawful rent and any increase are calculated, because most "non-payment" fights are really disputes over an underpaid increase.

The Legal Framework: Rent as a Core Tenant Obligation

Residential and roofed-workplace leases in Turkey are governed by the Turkish Code of Obligations (TBK, Law No. 6098). Under Article 313 TBK, paying rent is the tenant's primary obligation, and a tenant who fails to perform it is in breach.

When a fixed-term lease renews automatically each year, usually with a contractual increase, the tenant stays bound by the updated rent. A tenant cannot avoid default by continuing to pay last year's figure once a valid increase has taken effect, which is one of the most common triggers for the disputes covered below.

Turkish law gives landlords two remedies you can pursue at the same time: enforcement proceedings to collect the unpaid rent, and an eviction action to recover possession. You do not have to choose one and abandon the other. For the wider picture of how these claims fit together, see our guide to landlord and tenant disputes in Turkey.

Foreign owners enjoy the same landlord rights as Turkish nationals. There is no separate, harsher regime for non-resident or non-citizen landlords. The procedure is technical and runs in Turkish before Turkish authorities, so local representation is strongly advisable, especially for foreign property owners in Turkey who cannot attend in person.

How Much Rent Is the Tenant Actually Required to Pay?

Before you can say a tenant has underpaid, you have to know the lawful rent. Most disputes that look like "non-payment" are really arguments about the annual increase.

For residential leases, Article 344 TBK caps the yearly increase at the twelve-month average of the consumer price index (TÜFE/CPI) published by TÜİK. The lease can set a lower increase, but not a higher one. A tenant who keeps paying the old rent after a lawful CPI increase has taken effect is underpaying, and that shortfall can put them in default.

For roofed-workplace (commercial) leases, the increase is generally governed by the contract and the same CPI logic, and longer-term commercial leases have their own renewal-rent rules. If your dispute turns on what the contract permits, our commercial lease review and drafting team can check whether the increase clause is enforceable before you act on arrears.

When Is Rent Legally "Late"? Payment Timing and Default

Default depends on the payment date in your lease. Under Article 314 TBK, unless the contract says otherwise, the tenant must pay the rent (and any agreed ancillary expenses) at the end of each rental period.

Most leases fix a specific window. If the contract says rent is due "between the 1st and the 5th of each month," payment must reach the landlord by the end of the 5th. Miss that and the tenant is in default, which starts the clock on the remedies below.

Turkish courts apply this strictly. Rent must be paid in full and on time, and case law treats an incomplete payment as non-payment: even a small shortfall can count as a failure to pay the rent in full, and a partial or symbolic payment does not cure the default. The safe assumption for a tenant is that anything less than the full lawful rent, paid by the due date, is a breach.

Step One: Mandatory Mediation Before You Sue

This is the step most older guides miss. Since 1 September 2023, lease disputes, including eviction claims and claims for unpaid rent, are subject to mandatory mediation as a precondition to suit (dava şartı arabuluculuk) under the Mediation Law (HUAK No. 6325, as amended by Law No. 7445). You cannot validly file most lease lawsuits without first applying to a mediator and obtaining the final report.

Mediation does not apply to the enforcement route (İİK) in the same way: applying to the enforcement office to open proceedings is not a lawsuit and does not require prior mediation. The mediation requirement bites when you go to court, for example to set aside the tenant's objection or to file the eviction lawsuit itself. This split is one reason landlords often start enforcement and prepare the mediation in parallel.

Route 1: Enforcement Proceedings and the Payment Order

The most common path is enforcement-based eviction under Article 269 İİK (Law No. 2004). A key advantage is that you do not need a prior court judgment to start: you apply to the enforcement office, which serves the tenant with a payment order that includes an eviction warning (tahliye ihtarlı ödeme emri). This is itself the enforcement-route eviction, with its own deadlines, and it is one application within our broader İİK enforcement proceedings practice.

The payment order triggers two deadlines that run in parallel from service:

• 7 days to object to the debt or the lease relationship; and
• 30 days to pay the overdue rent in full.

What happens next depends on the tenant:

• Tenant pays within 30 days — the debt is settled and the eviction claim for this default falls away.
• Tenant does nothing — with no objection and no payment, the proceeding becomes final and you can pursue eviction through the enforcement office.
• Tenant objects within 7 days — the enforcement track is suspended and you must take the dispute to the Civil Court of Peace (after mediation, where required) to have the objection set aside and to obtain eviction.

For Article 269 İİK to lead to eviction smoothly, the lease should be in writing, the rent must be due, the tenant must have failed to pay, and the payment order must contain the eviction warning and the statutory deadlines. An oral lease can be proved, but it is harder, and the enforcement route is less clean. You can also use this file to recover the arrears as a money debt; our guide to recovering unpaid amounts as a debt in Turkey explains how collection runs alongside eviction.

Route 2: The Eviction Lawsuit (Tahliye Davası) Under Article 315 TBK

Where you prefer a direct judicial route, or where the tenant has objected to enforcement, you pursue an eviction lawsuit (tahliye davası). Under Article 315 TBK, a landlord faced with non-payment must first serve a written demand granting at least 30 days to clear the arrears (30 days is the minimum for residential and roofed-workplace leases). If the tenant still does not pay within that period, you may terminate the lease and sue for eviction, after completing mandatory mediation.

The case is heard by the Civil Court of Peace (Sulh Hukuk Mahkemesi) in the district where the property is located (HMK No. 6100). The court checks whether the lease exists, whether the rent was genuinely due, whether the lawful amount was correctly calculated, and whether the statutory notice and deadlines were respected before ordering the tenant out.

The Two 30-Day Periods Are Not the Same: İİK 269 vs TBK 315

Foreign owners often confuse the two "30-day" periods. They sit in different tracks and start at different points. The table below shows them side by side.

In practice the two routes are complementary: the İİK file pressures payment and can collect the debt, while the TBK 315 process secures the eviction judgment if the tenant fights.

The "Two Valid Notices" Ground for Eviction (Article 352/2 TBK)

A separate and powerful ground sits in Article 352/2 TBK. If, within the same lease year, you serve the tenant with two valid written notices (iki haklı ihtar) for non-payment of rent, you can file for eviction once that lease year ends, regardless of whether the tenant eventually paid each time.

This matters for a chronically late payer. A tenant who pays only after each formal notice may believe they are safe because the debt is always cleared, but two such notices in a single rental year can independently justify eviction. This ground remains a standard, actively applied basis for eviction in current Court of Cassation practice.

What the Tenant Can Do Back

Anticipating the tenant's moves helps you avoid surprises. A tenant in a non-payment dispute commonly tries one of these:

• Pay into court or via consignment (tevdi mahalli / mahkeme veznesine ödeme). Where the tenant says they tried to pay but you refused, or there is a genuine dispute about the amount, the tenant can deposit the rent with the designated authority. A valid consignment can count as timely payment and defeat a default claim, so the date and amount deposited matter.
• Dispute the increase. The tenant may argue the increase exceeded the lawful CPI ceiling under Art. 344 TBK, so they were not actually in arrears. This is why the rent-calculation step above is decisive.
• Object to enforcement within 7 days, which suspends the İİK file and pushes the fight into court.
• Set off against the deposit, which is rarely permitted unilaterally (see below).

None of these is automatically a defence, but each can delay you if your notices, figures or service are not airtight.

The Security Deposit (Depozito) and Set-Off

Under Article 342 TBK, a security deposit for residential and roofed-workplace leases is capped at three months' rent, and money deposits must be placed in a bank account that cannot be withdrawn without the consent of both parties (or a court decision or enforcement). A landlord generally cannot simply help themselves to the deposit to cover unpaid rent during the lease, and a tenant cannot stop paying rent on the basis that "the deposit covers it."

In short, do not treat the deposit as a self-help remedy for ongoing arrears. The proper path is notice, then enforcement or an eviction lawsuit, with the deposit dealt with on its own terms when the lease ends.

Retroactive Rent and the Five-Year Limitation Period

You can usually claim retroactive rent, including amounts a tenant underpaid, unless a written agreement (for example an email or message) clearly waived the increase. The Court of Cassation (Yargıtay) has held that accepting partial rent does not amount to giving up the increase; collecting underpaid rent is not treated as silent consent to a frozen rent.

Time limits matter. Rent claims are subject to the five-year limitation period under Article 147 TBK. But limitation must be raised by the tenant as a defence; the court does not apply it automatically, and it must be invoked in time to be effective. Act on arrears promptly rather than letting old rent accumulate.

After the Judgment: Enforcing the Eviction

An eviction judgment is not self-executing. Once you have a final, enforceable decision, you take it to the enforcement office (icra müdürlüğü), which issues a notice giving the tenant a short period to leave voluntarily. If the tenant still does not go, the office carries out a physical eviction (icra marifetiyle / zorla tahliye), removing the tenant and handing possession back to you, if needed with the help of officials.

The practical timeline varies with the court's workload, whether the tenant objected or appealed, and how busy the local enforcement office is. There is no fixed national figure, and we never promise a particular outcome or duration, but a clean file with valid notices, correct figures and proper service is the single biggest factor in keeping the process moving.

Costs and Formalities for a Foreign Owner

Anxious foreign owners usually want to know what the process takes in practical terms. The main items are:

• Court and enforcement fees, which are set by official tariffs and depend on the amount claimed and the steps taken.
• A power of attorney (vekaletname). You can run the whole matter from abroad, but the PoA must be issued for use in Turkey, typically before a Turkish notary, or at a Turkish consulate, or before a foreign notary with an apostille and a sworn Turkish translation. This formality is what lets your lawyer serve notices, open the enforcement file and attend hearings without you travelling.
• Translation and notary costs for the PoA and any foreign-language documents.
• Mediation fees, a modest cost for the mandatory mediation stage.

How a Lawyer Strengthens Your Position

Most landlord losses in these cases come from procedural slips: a notice that does not meet the statutory requirements, a miscalculated 30-day period, the wrong court, a skipped mediation step, or an enforcement file missing the eviction warning. A single defect can send you back to the start.

Our real estate team handles the full process for foreign owners: calculating the lawful rent and increase, serving compliant notices, completing mandatory mediation, opening İİK enforcement, responding to tenant objections, and filing eviction lawsuits before the Civil Court of Peace, all on a power of attorney so you do not need to travel. To review your situation, contact Lexin Legal.

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