İSTANBUL — When her husband ends the day shift, Gamze Sarı works the night shift to support her family of four. They rent a small, damp apartment without central heating in one of İstanbul’s low-income neighborhoods but still struggle to pay the bills.
“Our home is a 1+1 apartment. Only one room has a stove, the other is cold,” Sarı, 33, told Turkey recap. “My husband, my two children and I sleep in the one heated room.”
The family lives in İkitelli, about 20 km west of İstanbul’s city center, on the border between Küçükçekmece and Başakşehir. The neighborhood is known for its industrial zone and textile workshops, which operate on the ground floor of most buildings in the area.
As a result, many working-class families and refugees live in İkitelli, but this doesn’t mean workers can find affordable housing in the neighborhood. Sarı said she pays 8,000 liras a month for rent, which is below the average rent in İstanbul (25,000 liras), but the home remains costly for minimum wage-earners like her husband and comes with trade-offs.
“My 10-year-old daughter has no space to study. Our house is old, cold and damp,” Sarı said, adding her children are often sick due to the temperature changes in their home.
She also noted İkitelli is a high-risk earthquake zone. Most apartments in the area are densely packed together and were built before the 1999 İzmit earthquake prompted the establishment of stricter building codes.
“Rents are high, and our wages are not enough to rent a safe home," she added.
Sarı’s concerns are likely shared by many families. Despite a recent 30 percent hike to Turkey’s minimum wage – now 22,104 liras a month – many working-class İstanbul residents are having troubles making ends meet following years of high inflation and steep rent increases.
In its most recent cost of living index, the municipality-affiliated İstanbul Planning Agency (İPA) calculated that in November the average income needed to sustain a family of four in the city was more than 75,000 TL per month, twice the amount needed 18 months earlier.
This comes as housing prices rose 346 percent in Turkey between 2018-2022, according to OECD data. In contrast, housing prices rose 8.1 percent in Finland, 20 percent in Denmark and 51.3 percent in Iceland over the same period.
"I've been living in this house for three years,” Sarı said. “We've said ‘yes’ to everything the landlord has asked just so he doesn't kick us out ... He raised our rent to 8,000 lira in August. This house is not worth 8,000 lira, but we said 'okay' because we had no other choice.”
Minimum wages
Sarı’s husband works overtime at a printing house, 6 am-8 pm, but his earnings bring in a maximum of 30,000 liras per month, which is not enough to support the family.
During the day, Sarı takes care of her younger child while her 10-year old daughter goes to school. She said she can’t work in the daytime because she can’t afford a daycare, which costs at least 10,000 liras a month in İstanbul.
Instead, after the children are in bed, Sarı works the night shift at a factory doing packaging work to bring in extra income.
In recent months, the family got some relief after the older daughter’s school opened an after school study program for students who need a place to do their homework. Sarı said this addressed one of their problems, but she continues to seek out a newly built home that meets earthquake zone regulations.
“I recently asked about an apartment in the same neighborhood, a new building,” she said. “The rent for a 1+1 apartment with natural gas is 17,000 liras. We have no way of paying for this.”
She went on, saying her search has become more urgent since her landlord began pressuring her family to move out.
“He keeps knocking on the door. He wants us to leave so he can rent the house for more. We had a big fight,” she continued. “Interest rates, inflation and the ruthlessness of landlords are the reasons why these rents are so high.”
Real estate prices
The number of affordable homes are increasingly limited for low-income families in İkitelli. An online search of available flats in the neighborhood indicates a top floor, 2+1 apartment in a more than 20-year-old building currently goes for about 15,000 lira a month.
Pictures of these apartments on real estate sites often show small living rooms and small kitchens as well as bathrooms without shower cabins and tiling.
When looking at the rentals in new buildings, the monthly rate of a 2+1, 80 square meter apartment is about 19,500 lira. Although the rooms are often small, most of these flats can adequately host a family.
If tenants want to find a flat for half of the minimum wage, they’ll come across ads that include some or all of the following words in their descriptions: Without natural gas, basement floor, damp, 60 square meters – or less.
Prices for new homes in more livable areas of İstanbul start at 35,000 lira or higher. The Ministry of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change did not respond to a request for comment for this report.
‘One salary is not enough for one rent’
Fatih Özçelik is the muhtar, an elected neighborhood representative, of Mehmet Akif Ersoy neighborhood, which is next to İkitelli. He told Turkey recap that when people can’t afford rents, they apply for help at his office.
“If a person is a tenant, they give 15,000 lira for rent,” Özçelik said. “This is the biggest expense and it is mandatory. You can cut back on food and clothing, but you can't cut back on rent. You have to pay it.”
He continued, estimating utility and apartment bills add another 3,000 liras to monthly housing costs.
“It is not possible for a minimum wage earner to make ends meet with these rents,” Özçelik said.
He said his office directs people who can’t afford living costs to apply for cash assistance programs with the District Governor and other social assistance organizations.
The mismatch between the cost of living and minimum wage has shifted not only the real estate market, but also societal trends.
According to statistics from the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK), the rate of people living in their own homes decreased from 60.6 percent in 2012 to 56.7 percent in 2022. Meanwhile, the rate of those living in rented homes increased from 20.9 percent to 27.2 percent over the same period.
Researcher Sinan Araman drew attention to Turkey’s growing housing crisis in 2022 with his book “Türkiye'de Konut Balonu” or "Housing Bubble in Turkey". In an interview with Turkey recap, Araman linked the nation’s housing problems with the state’s failure to develop a social housing program.
“The housing crisis in Europe is not as severe as in Turkey, and the main reason for this is that Europe has a social housing stock,” Araman said. “Even though social housing has decreased in Europe, they still either provide housing or rent assistance. This situation also controls the market.”
He went on, saying new homes have been built across much of the country over the last 25 years, but that the added housing stock has yet to solve affordability issues. The same is true, he said, for the government’s low-interest home loan programs, which remain inaccessible to people due to rising real estate prices.
“No matter how large the home loan is, a minimum wage earner cannot pay the loan installments in ten years [the maximum time allowed on many loans in Turkey] because the house prices are very high,” Araman said. “In the end, real estate owners benefited from cheap housing loan programs.”
“One salary is not enough for one rent, so how will these people live?" he asked, referring to minimum wage earners.
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