Abstract:

This study is focused on the crisis dynamics of the construction and real estate sectors during the economic turmoil that Turkey is going through. In this context, a discussion will be held on the theoretical literature of the position of the environmental production in the financed capitalism and the dynamics of the crisis that this position brings with it, and in the light of this discussion, the example of Turkey will be considered as a construction explosion that occurs in the framework of the variegated financing. The findings of the study show that the "boom-bust" cycle in which the construction sector in Turkey has lived in the years of the AKP has "carma" qualities in terms of similarity to global patterns. Since 2017, with the construction sector producing 9.8% of the total added value, Turkey, OECD countries are in the first place, and this ratio is very close to the pre-crisis values of countries such as Ireland, Spain, which experience major crashes in the 2008 crisis. On the other hand, the crisis dynamics of the construction sector, which has entered a blockade period since 2018, are different from global patterns. The mortgage markets, which are considered as a major risk source, are far from creating a remarkable risk source, although they have shown a big breakthrough in the years of the AKP with the regulations that approach finance and real estate. With the mortgage volume that is only 6% of GDP, Turkey is looking behind not only developed capitalist countries, but many Southern countries. On the other hand, the rapid growth wave in the markets of GYO, another mechanism that combines real estate and finance, ended by 2018, with a loss of 35% of value in the last 1.5 years. With a 34% share of the industry's leading public organization, Real Estate Housing GYO's value loss in the same period was 60%. However, it is clearly above the country’s average between 2012-2017; from 2017 the real, from 2019 the Istanbul housing market, which is nominally losing value, gives the image of a housing balloon that is exploding. High interest rates, falling prices, decreased sales and more than 1 million unselled new housing added to the housing stock in the last 6 years show that the industry is experiencing a deep gap. Furthermore, the concerned gap is experienced despite the measures such as the reduction of VAT to keep the sector standing by the AKP power, housing mobility, providing low-percentage housing loans through public banks. Among the companies closed since 2017, the construction and real estate sectors, with a share of 20%, are among the sectors that have been severely affected by the economic flows. Furthermore, when non-financial organizations are held outside, 23% of the total external debt is above these two sectors. In addition, indicators of the use guaranteed public-private cooperation treaties and mega-projects guaranteed treasury show that the blockade in the sector has begun to create a clear burden on the public expenditure. When fully assessed, these indicators indicate a severe crisis in the construction-based accumulation process that marked the years of the AKP. Unlike the patterns highlighted in global literature, the construction crisis of Turkey is not the mortgage markets, but the contractor debt is highlighted as the lead crisis dynamics.

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