Best Ways to Save Money When Living in Turkey

There are two essential steps to saving money in Turkey. The first step is cutting on your living expenses and putting some money aside. The second step is keeping the value of your money by making an investment and putting that money to use.

Whether you’ve come to Turkey to visit or to settle permanently, you should learn the best ways to save money when living in Turkey for a sustainable lifestyle and for the sake of your budget. Before, achieving the first step might have been enough to save money in Turkey. However, for the last few years, the inflation rates are on an upward spiral.

The high inflation rates are causing the Turkish Lira to devaluate day by day. This makes step two a crucial one as well. Let’s examine these steps and how to achieve them a bit more closely.

Money Saving Tips in Turkey

You can put a considerable amount of money aside in some time by using the money saving tips we will list below. These tips to save money in Turkey have proven to be beneficial for both locals and travelers. Here are some easy-to-do and efficient tips for saving money in Turkey;

• Prepare Your Own Food

Considering the rents and employee salaries it’s no wonder that it’s more costly to eat a meal outside than to prepare it yourself at home. So, it would be better to prepare your own meals when you can to save money.

If it’s not possible to prepare your own lunch or dinner when you’re going out, you can save money by avoiding unnecessarily expensive restaurants. For instance, eating in restaurants and cafes on the coastline always are more costly. Famous shopping areas where the stores of luxury brands are located are also not budget-friendly.

• Don’t Hesitate to Haggle

Haggling when shopping from small stores and shops is also one of the best ways to save money in Turkey. Owners of the small stores or shops, called “esnaf” in Turkish, are known to give different prices depending on the buyers’ ability to haggle. For this reason, haggling has become a local tradition, especially in touristic areas.

Since haggling has become a tradition, sellers generally give higher prices than the product’s worth, so don’t hesitate to ask for a price discount. The trick here is, not to ask for a price discount where products have price tags.

• Avoid the Buy-One-Get-One-Frees

Buy-one-get-one-frees always sound like a sweet deal, however, this is one of the most basic tricks of marketing. These deals not only entice you to buy more than you actually need but also cost you almost always the same amount of money as the non-discounted product.

In these kinds of deals, the price of the second product is generally added to the price of the first product. Another trick is the downsizing of the product, especially in the food and beverage industry.

• Beware of Busy Season

Generally, all kinds of restaurants, shops, stores, and places of accommodation have a tendency to rise in prices during busy seasons. Since human traffic increases during busy seasons, sellers try to increase their profits by rising the prices. So, it’s best to purchase non-urgent needs outside the busy seasons.

However, it’s best to keep in mind that the busy season might change depending on the city. For instance, summer is the busy season for coastal cities like Antalya, Alanya, Bodrum, and Fethiye. On the other hand, winter is the busy season for the cities of Bursa and Yalova where you can enjoy winter sports and hot springs.

In Ankara’s case, the academic year might be considered as the busy season. Although Ankara is one of the most budget friendly cities in Turkey, the prices might rise a little bit during the academic year because thousands of people from all around Turkey flock to Ankara.

• Use Public Transport

Recent increases in the prices of fuels like oil and gasoline have now made driving to one place with your own vehicle more costly than ever. Using public transport when going somewhere, especially for long distances will save you a considerable amount of money.

If you’re using public transport outside hectic hours, going somewhere with public transport won’t take much longer than going with your own vehicle. Plus, you won’t have to worry about where to park your vehicle or the cost of parking areas when you use public transport.

Keeping and Increasing the Value of Your Savings Through Investment

As we have mentioned in the above paragraphs, keeping the value of your assets is now harder due to high inflation rates. If you just let your savings sit in a regular cash account or at home, your savings will be worth less and less as time passes by because the prices are increasing rapidly. For this reason, you should come up with an investment plan to keep the value of your savings and gradually increase them.

One of the most common investment methods is savings accounts. Savings accounts allow you to earn interest for your savings for the time period you lock them in the bank. Another investment method is purchasing government bonds. Government bonds also pay interest at regular intervals during the year; generally twice a year.

Government bonds generally pay higher rates of interest. However, keep in mind, they are usually more suitable for long-term investments. Another popular investment method is purchasing gold through online banking. This investment method is suitable for almost everyone.

On the other hand, people who are interested in economics prefer to invest in the stock market. Purchasing individual stocks or mutual funds can be done online as well. These investment methods may bring nice profits even in the short term.

However, investing in the stock market comes with its own risks as well. So, it would be better to get professional guidance before starting.

The oldest, probably the most common, and less risky way of investment is real estate investment. Accommodation is one of the primary needs of people. For this reason, the demand for rental apartments or other types of properties in Turkey seems like never going to cease in near future.

People who buy apartments or commercial properties in sought-after areas can earn a high rental income steadily. You can check out our rental income guaranteed properties in Turkey to make a hassle-free and profitable investment.

Hopefully, this brief article has been helpful for understanding how to save money in Turkey. You can contact us without hesitation for further questions on life in Turkey or real estate investment in Turkey.

Leyla Zengin

AUTHORLeyla ZenginMarketing Services Manager

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