The seller answers for defects even without knowing of them, buildings carry their own five-year limitation period (twenty on gross fault), and a consumer buyer of a home gets a second layer on top.
A seller in Türkiye answers for defects in what it sold even where it did not know of them, and for every quality it communicated in any manner (Article 219 of Turkish Code of Obligations No. 6098). Claims arising from a building being defective are time-barred five years from the transfer of ownership, and twenty years where the seller is grossly at fault (Article 244/3) — not the general two years. Where the buyer is a consumer and the property is a home or holiday immovable, a second layer applies under Consumer Protection Law No. 6502: four elective remedies, a presumption in the buyer’s favour for the first six months, and a five-year period that does not run at all where the defect was concealed by gross fault or fraud. The position below is as at September 2026.
What counts as a defect?
Article 219 runs two tests together: departure from what was promised — the qualities the seller communicated in any manner — and absence of what the property objectively ought to have, meaning material, legal or economic defects that destroy the value for the intended use or materially reduce the benefits expected. Liability is strict, not fault-based. Article 8 of Law No. 6502 adds a commercially significant point: a good is also defective where it lacks features stated on the packaging, label, user manual, internet portal, or in advertising. Where units are sold off renderings and promises of a pool, a garden and parking, that turns the brochure into contractual content.
Sale or works contract?
The characterisation changes both the remedies and the periods. A buyer of a completed unit, or of one finished against a price paid to the seller, is under the sale provisions, and Article 227 gives four elective remedies: rescission on declaring readiness to return the property, price reduction in proportion to the defect, free repair unless it requires excessive expense, and replacement where possible — damages reserved.
A party who commissioned construction — including a landowner in a land-share-for-construction arrangement — is instead under the works contract (eser sözleşmesi) provisions in Articles 470 onwards, where Article 475 gives only three remedies: rescission, price reduction, free repair. Rescission is doubly restricted: available only where the work is so defective that the employer cannot use it or cannot in fairness be required to accept it, and unavailable altogether where the work stands on the employer’s own immovable and removing it would cause excessive harm. For buildings that closes the rescission door and moves the fight to price reduction, repair and damages. Consumer law applies either way: Article 3/1(l) of Law No. 6502 expressly brings works contracts within the definition of a consumer transaction.
Notice — and the 30-day myth
Article 223 requires the buyer to inspect as soon as the ordinary course of business allows and to notify within an appropriate period; neglecting either step means the property is deemed accepted. Article 474 imposes the same duty under a works contract. But Law No. 6502 contains no notice deadline expressed in days for consumer sales — Articles 8 to 12 know no such rule, and the widely repeated “30 days” belongs to repealed legislation. “Appropriate period” is an objective assessment, not a figure, so the safe course is the same either way: written notice through a notary (noter) as soon as the defect is found.
Two rules cut the buyer’s way. Article 225 stops a grossly at-fault seller from escaping liability because notice was late, as it does for defects a professional seller ought to know; and Article 221 voids any clause excluding or limiting defect liability where the seller is grossly at fault. Latent defects then have their own rule, and they dominate construction disputes because structural, waterproofing and buried-services problems do not show at handover: Article 223/2 disapplies the deemed-acceptance presumption to a defect ordinary inspection could not reveal, requiring notice immediately on discovery, while Article 477 releases the contractor once the work is accepted except for defects it intentionally concealed.
Signing the handover record without reservation can be read as implied acceptance. If you must take delivery before the snagging list is closed, sign subject to an express written reservation itemising what is outstanding.
How long you have, and what consumer law adds
In sale the general period is two years from transfer (Article 231/1), but buildings displace it: Article 244/3 gives five years from the transfer of ownership and twenty years where the seller is grossly at fault. Article 478 runs parallel periods under a works contract from delivery — five years for immovable structures, twenty on the contractor’s gross fault. Under consumer law, Article 12/1 gives five years from delivery for homes and holiday immovables, and Article 12/3 carries the strongest rule of all: the limitation provisions do not apply where the defect was concealed by gross fault or fraud.
Consumer law also shifts the evidence. Article 10/1 treats defects appearing within six months of delivery as having existed at delivery and puts proof that the good was not defective on the seller. Repair or replacement must be completed within 60 working days for homes and holiday immovables — not the 30 working days applicable to movables — failing which the consumer may turn to the other remedies (Article 11/4). Damages may be claimed alongside (Article 11/6), and the producer and importer are jointly and severally liable with the seller for repair and replacement (Article 11/2).
The seismic and inspection paper trail
The construction permit date fixes the technical code: the Turkish Building Earthquake Code (Türkiye Bina Deprem Yönetmeliği), published on 18 March 2018, entered into force on 1 January 2019 and repealed the 2007 regulation on buildings in seismic zones, so anything permitted earlier was designed under the older code. Ask also for the inspection file, laboratory reports, the soil and foundation study and the building identity certificate (bina kimlik sertifikası) added to Law No. 4708 by Law No. 7410 of 10 June 2022 — noting that Article 1 excludes some buildings from inspection altogether, including standalone buildings of no more than two storeys above the basement not exceeding 200 m². And although Article 30 of Zoning Law No. 3194 requires an occupancy permit (yapı kullanma izni) before a completed building may be used, the same article states that it does not relieve the owner of liability for non-compliance with the law, the permit or its annexes. It is no certificate of structural soundness.
The same file usually shows whether the occupancy permit was ever issued, a point whose consequences are set out in which transactions are blocked without an occupancy permit.
Who is liable, and where the claim goes
The seller answers under the sale, including a developer selling units from its own share; the contractor answers under the works contract to whoever commissioned it. Outside any contractual link there is a statutory route: Article 3 of Law No. 4708 makes building inspection companies, supervising architects and engineers, project authors, laboratory personnel and the building contractor liable in proportion to their fault, to the building owner and the relevant administration, for damage caused by the building being constructed contrary to the permit and its annexes, or to the rules of science, art and health, or defectively — for fifteen years for the load-bearing system (taşıyıcı sistem) and two years for non-load-bearing parts, running from the occupancy permit. Article 28 of Law No. 3194 points the same way for technical supervisors (fenni mesul), the contractor and the site manager. For common parts, Article 35 of Condominium Law No. 634 puts measures to prevent a period lapsing or a right being lost within the manager’s (yönetici) duties, taken on the owners’ behalf — though that does not make an individual buyer dependent on the block: each owner may still pursue its own contract and claim, for a defect in the common parts, the portion corresponding to its land share (arsa payı).
For 2026, consumer disputes worth less than TRY 186,000 go to the Consumer Arbitration Committee, which cannot hear anything above that figure; above it the consumer court has jurisdiction under Article 73/1 — a jurisdiction not capped by any upper monetary limit. Consumer claimants are exempt from court fees and may sue where the consumer resides. Mediation is a condition of suit (Article 73/A), with disputes arising from the ayn of the immovable expressly excluded. Article 400 of Civil Procedure Law No. 6100 also allows pre-action preservation of evidence — the natural step for a defect about to disappear under repair work.
A construction defect is a question of characterisation, then of time, then of proof. What usually costs a buyer the claim is silence: accepting delivery without reservation, relying on email instead of notarial notice, waiting until the evidence has been painted over. See also apartment delivery delay rights, suing a developer in the Turkish consumer courts, buying property in Türkiye as a foreigner, the stage-by-stage guide to protecting a property investment in Türkiye and our real estate practice.
