The tensions are high between landlords and tenants these days. For those who grew up in big cities and continue to live there, costs of living conditions are much higher than before. Foreign demand in the housing market results in rents significantly exceed the inflation rate despite the existing tenancy laws.
Interestingly, there may be tenants who pay different rents for flats with the same characteristics in the same building. Older tenants pay relatively low rents, while new tenants pay the new rates. As the landlords hear that higher rents are paid in similar apartments, they start negotiating with their tenants.
Another problem is that it is not easy to find the true value of a house. It is absolutely necessary to develop a clear approach to ensure that the landlords do not suffer under the everchanging conditions, and the tenants do not become victims. It is not possible for ordinary Turkish people to consistently pay the rents that immigrants from the Middle East are willing to accept or offer to pay. On the other hand, it is not possible either to ignore that rents will increase at the same rate in the face of continuously rising inflation.
A landlord may ask their tenant to increase the rent by the legally determined percentage, however if this landlord sees that a similar flat in the same building is rented for a higher price, of course, a dispute may inevitably arise between the landlord and the tenant. Nevertheless, landlords must make an assessment by considering the positive behaviour of the tenant, especially in terms of paying the rent in time, as well as the way they treat the place in which they live. There may be people who are ready to pay a higher price than the market price for a property, but this does not show that they are respected or trustworthy people.
“No One Want to Lose Money But…”
Some people may be willing to pay a higher price for a good or service for different reasons. Let me illustrate with an experience I had: A couple of years ago, young investors had made great earnings from the capital market. And the summer of that year, they flocked to a small and charming holiday town in Turkey to spend that money. But their arrival had unfortunately disrupted the economic balances of the town since they were tipping half the food bill, paying exorbitant prices for sunbeds, and renting houses for amounts several times higher than those in Istanbul, all of which eventually led to astronomical rises in the prices of goods and services offered in that town.
This situation had nothing to do with the market or supply and demand. This was about a group of people who, like a swarm of locusts, converged on this little town to spend some quickly earned money, and unthoughtfully causing prices to go up. Unfortunately, today, this town has become so populated that it is nearly impossible to walk through the crowd, and unlike its European counterparts, it has lost its innocence and authenticity. Human beings are greedy, that is a fact, but the world is full of so many people who try to avoid honouring the terms of their commercial contracts due to their greed for making money.
As opposed to those I mentioned above, today, there are more and more people who live without enjoying the money they earn. Yes, they can sell or rent their possessions for high amounts of money, but they cannot ensure the stability of their financial situation. People who fail to fulfil the principle of “pacta sunt servanda” are, almost always, financially harmed. Doing business by following the rules of trade brings no damage to anyone.
