Summer house rents soaring ahead of holiday season

Holidaymakers are already searching for summer houses to spend their vacation in Turkey's coastal towns but only to find that rent prices have skyrocketed.

On average, the rent of an apartment in the tourist hotspot Bodrum, on the Aegean coast, is now around 30,000 Turkish Liras ($2,000), while prices for luxury units can go up to between 100,000 and 250,000 euros.

In Alaçatı and Çeşme, rents for a regular apartment are around 6,000 liras, whereas it is 150,000 liras for villas.

In Kaş, another favorite holiday destination, the rent of a villa is 4,000 liras a night.

Rents are on the rise also in the southern province of Antalya. But the reason for this increase is not holidaymakers but Russians and Ukrainians who are moving to the province after fleeing the ongoing war in Ukraine.

Demand for summer houses picked up after the coronavirus pandemic broke out as people wanted to stay away from the crowded cities.

Rents rose significantly in the wake of COVID-19 because of a limited supply of such houses. The increase was particularly significant in the popular resort towns.

"Demand is already huge. Landlords are not willing to lease out their properties on a yearly basis but only on a seasonal or monthly basis. Rents vary depending on the location, how close it is to the beach," said Süha Kumbasar, a real estate consultant in Bodrum.

The higher rents are causing problems for locals, forcing them to seek cheaper houses.

"For instance, civil servants working here are moving to remote parts of the town," Kumbasar said.

Şebnem Ünlü, another realtor in the town, recalled that a couple of years back, the monthly rent of a house was somewhere between 3,500 liras and 5,000 liras if it was rented for a year...