Requirements for Residence permit had been changed since the new Law on foreigners and international protection (since april 2014) released. So now for some of the residence permit (ikamet) types foreigner should provide financial documents which means has to open a bank account in Turkey. We explain it in details for you:
1. You should open bank account at any turkish bank on your own name. Most popular banks for that purpose are Garanti bank, AK bank, Deniz bank, HSBC bank, Ziraat bankası, Yapı Kredi bank, Küveit Türk bank and others.
2. Minimal amount of money (shows that foreigner is able to support her/himself during all the term of required Residence permit) which should be on account, is 500$ per month and 6000$ per year. It can be account in dollars or turkish lira (according to the exchange rates).
3. Standart account opening procedure requires residence permit, but as you dont have it yet, so most probably some of the bank departments can refuse to open account for you. Dont make panic, this is normal for Turkey , as banks still dont follow totally same procedure in every of their offices (reason is not understandable though, human factor) so you just keep trying on visiting different banks and their offices till you find the one who will do it. They do for sure but not all of them.
4. Ok, you’ve found a bank, but as you dont have residence permit yet, you should obtain a tax number at your local or nearest tax office (address is easy to find in google by writing your district name and turkish “vergi dairesi”). They will issue your personal tax number by your passport (some of them ask also copy of passport pages). Later you will use this number also when you will need to pay for your residence permit paperwork. You should have that tax number already when you go to bank for account opening.
5. Bank account opened and you put your money on it, now you have to ask your bank assistant to issue your bank account statement (it turkish it calls “hesap ekstresi” or “hesap özeti”). There should be also stamp and manager’s sign.
Congratulations! your bank statement is ready! 🙂
We wish you to take your Residence permit easy and fast ! 🙂
P.S. : dear Readers, we would be very happy if you can share your personal experience, advice or tips regards the procedure of openning a bank account in Turkey below in comments. Also it will be useful for others if you can write the exact bank office and address where you opened account without residence permit card. Thank you a lot and have a good day! 🙂
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Could you tell me the address of the bank office where you opened your bank account?
We’ve tried branches of TEB, iş bankası, yapıkredi and garanti bankası in Ümraniye/Istanbul with no luck..
I guess I answered you in Fcebook page. Also I have idea, may be you can try banks in Kadikoy as that area is more familiar with foreigners
In which bank I can open account without residence permit? I’m getting crazy!
Thank you
hello,
all banks can open that accounts, but the problem is some of their branches dont know how or just dont wanna deal with it as it requires some not so standart paperwork for foreigner, who is not turkish citizen. You can just try different branches, and I would advice to try districts more central where foreigners live or touristic ones where banks more familiar with procedures about foreigners . I hope it helps . ..
Hi
Did you open an account without residence permit?
I have a question here,
I bought a house in tukey from (emlakçe ofis). the cost of the house was 150, 000 TL . I paid 40,000 during the contract sign. and the rest of amount agreed to be pain in the Notary office when receiving my tapu and keys.
Now, 70 days passed and I still waiting the security approval. the emlakce says you need to wait more. I’m afraid this man is not honest and he is does some fraudulent things. because I don’t speak Turkish and don’t know if there is a website online that I can follow up the status of my tapu process.
Please advice.
Thanks
Jaber
hello! As general, there is really this kind of security check up for new home owners who are not turkish citizens. And this permission sometimes takes few months to get. So if your real estate agent is reliable one, I would say he is not making tricks . This permission will be granted from military. Unfortunatelly there is no such a website where you can track your process, the only way is to push your real estate guys to call there and find out the latest situation of your process.
Hello, i have the same problem as the guys above: no bank in kadikoy allows me to open a bank account without the ikamet. Do you have a specific bank AND area where i could get the account?
unfortunatelly I dont know specific banks , but you may ask other guys in our stayTURKISH facebook group, may be they can give you few certain places addresses stayTURKISH on Facebook
Hi Nicole
Did you find a bank?