One of the hottest of the property hotspots to emerge in recent years is Turkey. Thousands of miles of beautiful, undeveloped Mediterranean coastline have been drawing tourists, and homebuyers, in their thousands, and the growth in affordable property has led to a remarkable boom with the potential for large returns on relatively small investments.
The very undeveloped nature of the area means that most investment is being made ‘off-plan' – buying property before construction. The great advantage of buying off-plan is one of cost; put simply, it's cheaper to buy a home before it's built. Areas such as Fethiye and Bodrum – the two major centres of off-plan sales – have seen a number of developers move in to snap up cheap land in desirable locations, and top-quality villas and apartments are sprouting up all along the coast.
The old prejudices regarding construction quality, which dogged the Turkish market for a while, have now hopefully gone for good; construction is as good as anywhere on the Med, with a government-regulated five-year guarantee – the TSE – as standard.
In terms of value, Turkey's property market is experiencing massive inflation, which looks set to continue for some time to come. The downside of this is that prices aren't as low as they were – for example, buying a four-bedroom villa near Fethiye off-plan now costs, on average, slightly more than £100,000, although it must be noted that much lower prices can be found in less-sought-after locations. But the advantage is that prices are likely to carry on rising, taking the value of your home on completion far above the initial outlay.