If Your Title Deed Was Designated Forest or Annulled: The New Right Under Law No. 7584 (Additional Article 22 Guide)

What Is Additional Article 22 Added to the Forest Law by Law No. 7584?

Additional Article 22 is a provision that introduces a resolution mechanism for immovable properties which, although left within State forest boundaries during the forest cadastre, were created under land registry, cadastre, or zoning legislation and registered in the name of natural and legal persons. The regulation was added to Forest Law No. 6831 (Orman Kanunu) and opens a path to preserving or regaining ownership of the property.

The fundamental principle introduced by the article is as follows: for immovable properties that are not registered in the name of the Treasury and rest on a valid title deed record, the existing title deed is accepted as valid without any payment being required once certain conditions are met. This is a regulation with a direct effect for owners who risk losing their property due to a forest annotation or the annulment of their title deed.

This guide focuses solely on Additional Article 22. For all of the changes Law No. 7584 introduces in the field of real estate and land, see our general guide titled Changes in real estate and land law under Law No. 7584; and for the general effects of the law on title deed and land owners, see our article titled What does Law No. 7584 bring to title deed and land owners?

Who Does Additional Article 22 Cover?

The regulation distinguishes three basic situations. The path to be applied changes according to the legal position of the property and the owner; for this reason, each scenario must be assessed separately.

Owners Holding Title in Their Own Name

Owners of immovable properties that are not registered in the name of the Treasury, were created under land registry and cadastre or zoning legislation, and are still registered in the land registry in the name of natural or legal persons may apply to the administration. If the application is approved by the General Directorate of Forestry (Orman Genel Müdürlüğü), the existing title deed is accepted as valid without any payment being required, and any forest annotation is cancelled.

Those Whose Cadastral Determinations Are Under Litigation

For immovable properties whose cadastral determinations are the subject of litigation, the natural or legal persons who are parties to the case have the right to apply to the administration. In addition, if the General Directorate of Forestry, as a result of an examination and investigation conducted of its own motion, establishes the accuracy of the title deed records existing in the names of individuals, the title deed may be accepted as valid without waiting for an application.

Return of Properties Whose Title Deeds Were Annulled

Two separate situations are envisaged for immovable properties whose title deeds have been annulled by finalized decisions rendered in filed lawsuits. Where the title deed has been annulled but the decision has not yet been enforced, the procedure under the article is carried out if the property price has not been paid, or if the paid price is repaid to the Treasury. For immovable properties whose title deed has been annulled and which have been registered in the name of the Treasury following enforcement or voluntary relinquishment, the property is returned to the person concerned if the former owners or their contractual and legal successors apply within two years and repay to the Treasury the price previously received. In both cases, the price to be repaid to the Treasury cannot be less than the property's current market value.

The Principle of Being Free of Charge and Repayment to the Treasury

The most defining aspect of Additional Article 22 is that existing and valid title deeds are preserved without any payment being required. In other words, the owner holding title in their own name is not required to repurchase the property or make any payment; the title deed is directly accepted as valid and the forest annotation is cancelled.

By contrast, a different balance is observed in the return of immovable properties whose title deeds were previously annulled and passed to the Treasury. For the return of these properties, if a payment was previously made as the property price, this total amount must be repaid to the Treasury. The amount to be repaid cannot be less than the property's current market value. Market values are calculated by the General Directorate of National Real Estate (Milli Emlak Genel Müdürlüğü) under Law No. 6292.

Forest Law No. 6831 — Additional Article 22 (added by Article 14 of Law No. 7584)

"…in such cases the existing title deed records are accepted as valid without any payment being required, and any forest annotations in the land registers are cancelled and the relevant immovable properties are processed in accordance with the provisions of this Law."

Effect on Pending Lawsuits and Time Limits

Additional Article 22 also affects lawsuits currently in progress. Until the operations to be carried out are concluded, lawsuits that would need to be filed by the forest administration or the Treasury are not filed; in ongoing lawsuits, the operations under the article are accepted as a preliminary question (bekletici mesele). During this period, the mandatory forfeiture time limits regarding the filing of an action concerning the property's ownership do not run.

A ruling is issued that pending lawsuits become without subject matter, including title deed annulment and registration lawsuits waived by the parties, lawsuits regarding the removal of the forest annotation, and compensation lawsuits filed due to the annulment of the title deed of properties within the scope of this article. In this case, the litigation costs are left to the parties, and no attorney's fee is awarded in favor of the parties. If the return is effected, no compensation or occupancy fee (ecrimisil) may be claimed from the administrations in any way.

Which Immovable Properties Are Outside the Scope?

The regulation does not apply to every immovable property with a forest designation. The law expressly excludes places of a certain status from its scope. Knowing these exceptions is important for correctly assessing the legal nature of the property before applying.

The Difference Between Additional Article 22 and the 2/B Practice

The two concepts most frequently confused in practice are immovable properties within the scope of Additional Article 22 and 2/B lands. Yet these two represent opposite situations. 2/B lands are places that have lost their forest character in terms of science and technology, have been excluded from forest boundaries and registered in the name of the Treasury, and are generally used by possessors without title deeds; here, the entitled person purchases the property by paying its market value.

Additional Article 22, on the contrary, concerns the free-of-charge preservation or return of ownership in immovable properties that are already held by title deed in a person's name or whose title deed has been annulled. In 2/B the aim is to acquire property, while in Additional Article 22 it is to preserve or regain existing ownership. For the details of the determination of possession and the 2/B process, you may review our guide on the determination of possession in 2/B lands.

Competent Court and Application Process

Applications under Additional Article 22 are made to the administration, that is, to the General Directorate of Forestry (Orman Genel Müdürlüğü). The expenses to be incurred under this article are deposited by the title deed owners into the accounts of the General Directorate of Forestry as a service expense. The competent court in all disputes arising from the application of the article is the civil court of first instance (asliye hukuk mahkemesi) of the place where the property is located.

In provinces such as Antalya, where forest, coastal, and tourism areas are intertwined, this regulation may concern a broad mass of immovable property. Just like local owners with a forest annotation on their title deed, foreign owners who have acquired property in Türkiye and later encountered a forest delimitation on their title deed may also have an assessment made under Additional Article 22. The fact that a two-year application period is envisaged for properties whose title deeds were annulled requires the situation to be examined in a timely manner on a property-by-property basis.

Points to Consider Before Applying

Although Additional Article 22 may at first glance appear to be a simple administrative application, it contains numerous technical details that vary according to the property's title deed, cadastre, and litigation history. Assessment errors at these stages often produce irreversible results, because the process is tied both to forfeiture time limits and to finalized court decisions.

• Scope determination: Assuming that a property expressly excluded from the scope — such as an olive grove, pasture, or tourism region — is within the scope leads to an application that will be fruitless from the outset.
• Time management: For properties registered in the name of the Treasury, the two-year application period is a forfeiture period; once the period has passed, the possibility of return as a rule ceases to exist.
• Price calculation: The rule that the amount to be repaid to the Treasury cannot be less than the current market value makes an error in payment planning costly.
• Pending lawsuits: Failure to raise in a timely manner the acceptance of the operations under the article as a preliminary question in an ongoing title deed annulment lawsuit may prevent the process from working in the owner's favor.

For this reason, examining the property's forest cadastre, land register, and any litigation file holistically before applying is a decisive step that reduces the risk of losing rights.