Permanent Residency

[sammydavis]

On renewing our residency for another year (advised by new BRS man not to do two years as 'things may change' due to new government, we asked about permanent residency. We were shown to another office, called Beyaz office, where a man with reasonable English asked if we owned a house here, and how much did we pay for it. We told him, and he said all that was needed if we applied for Permanent residency was they would come out and do a valuation as how much it is worth now! I can only assume, although he didn't say so, that they would then charge some percentage of the difference between those two prices. We have 7 years of residency now - but he did not ask that question so I don't know what other criteria applies. Has anyone else had any experience of this procedure??

[Bridgett]

Following with interest...

[sophie]

There will be a lot of us following your progress believe me. Not been able to get very far in 14 years!!!

[sammydavis]

I am not sure what else we can do really. We renewed for one year, so it will now be next year when we may seriously pursue this - but the lack of information is weird, especially if it means more money for the authorities!

[Mr B]

I may be wrong, but I thought it was increased some years ago to 15 years before you could apply for permanent residency.

[Deniz1]

i think someone posted on here ages ago that the property must be worth more than £135000 and you have to have quite a lot of money in the bank. with governments coming and going quite rapidly the criteria changes every time and applications get put to the bottom of the pile.

[kerry 6138]

https://cyprusscene.com/2016/01/28/trnc ... rn-cyprus/

This information is from 2016.

[bigOz]

You would have had more of a chance if you applied when the previous government was in power. Members of the new right-wing government (who were in power 2 years ago) were reputed as a bunch of bribe-takers expecting personal favours for the process to move on. I would not hold my breath with these guys - trying to do things strictly by the book can take another decade or more before you would get anywhere!

By the way, the 6-7 year rule (I believe) is for foreign national people who have been working here with a permit and paying social security plus taxes continually, with no break in payments for the duration of the years. And they would get what is called a "white ID card" which in essence would give them all citizen rights except voting and no requirement for a work permit and/or renewal. The fact that they sent you to the "White room" indicates to me that ir was probably the section who dealt with the White ID cards.

After the white ID card, working here for another 5 years or so will upgrade you for an application to become a full citizen entitled to a normal TRNC ID card and/or passport. As someone else mentioned the total stay would add up to more than 10 years before you are even considered. The application process and receiving the actual ID can take up to 2 years (that is if you constantly chase the progress and regularly visit the department in the Ministry of Interior - often arguing with them about the time it is taking)

I can only think that the reason for pussy-footing is due to those who will drive the issue forward not being able to openly ask for a bribe. That can get them into serious trouble but if coming from the applicants themselves and depending on who you are talking to you may be asked an arm and a leg to get it done quickly. Then again if you try it on someone who is not inclined that way, you may find yourself in serious trouble (not that there has been any reports of such an event in the past).

The law does exist where people who buy the property and invest large sums of money in business can and will get an ID fairly quickly. But even then the stakes might be too high, especially if you are a good looking foreign lady - I know of a couple of cases where such ladies have visited few MPs for a private visit in their offices and got ID's at the speed of lightning. They also got government help in improving their local businesses and even cancelling of tax debts by the same "friendly" ministers/bureaucrats. I feel the main reason for this sort of activity is because of the original idea behind the whole passports against property rules. It was devised to attract and make it legal for capital transfer and investments by the Turkish businessmen and injecting replacement population from Turkey to cover for the departing Turkish Cypriots who are in economic dire straits and leaving the island to UK, Australia, USA, plus many other countries in Europe. A subject that has been attracting a lot of attention in the social and political media.

I am sorry if I have not been very encouraging, but I thought I would put the picture right for those who may wish to sail through the same rough seas!

[sammydavis]

I think there must be a difference between Citizenship and permanent Residency??? I can only say that the man in the 'white' room knew our ages and therefore knew we would not be here to work (!) and only said that a valuation on our house would be made implying that there would be a charge on the difference between purchase and time of application - again, it smacks of weirdness to me and he didn't make any comment on the years we had been applying for residency. We will see maybe next year.

[Keithcaley]

...implying that there would be a charge on the difference between purchase and time of application...

You say "implying"... - did he actually say anything about such a 'charge'? - or might the reason for the valuation to be to simply check that the 'asset value' reached the necessary criteria? - or for some other reason altogether?

[waddo]

If it is of any help - on a visit to the head man of the ministry that deals with all applications for Permanent Residency (got in because of a friend of a friend) he looked at the 11+ "visitor" stamps in the passport and asked why we bothered to get them as they are worthless and because of our ages we did not need them anyway. The criteria then was that we owned a property that cost us (not the value now) over 125.000 Euros, had full health insurance - which we could not get because of age - and could prove who long we had stayed here in each period of 180 days per 365 days. The period of stay was easy for us, 365 days out of 365 for the past 11 years, the health insurance was a show stopper and the house ownership was just a figure dreamed up, who paid more than 125,000 euros for a three bed property in 2001? In any case we had a leasehold which did not qualify even through it was over 100.000 euros in total. It is a game and nothing else. But if you come here to live and work it is a totally different ball game and you could even end up with some form of card! We gave up and just live here, still do our "visitor" thing every two years and just enjoy life.

[sophie]

sammydavis, please don't think we are being too negative, but most of us have, for years, been told what they think we want to hear. Personally my husband and I have been constantly lied to as to where our house is placed. . Only today we have discovered yet again another part of our garden and walls probably belong to someone else. That's after losing huge chunks of garden to the local Belediye a year ago, for which we were made to repair in full and received not one penny of compensation. The same goes for Citizenship etc you can never be sure of the truth. That's something that moves from day to day and is impossible to grab hold of. It seems to me that those with full work permits, pay into the Government Sigorta and own their own house with a full Title Deed (they are in the minority) are the only ones who are totally secure (or as secure as you can be here)

[karmels]

sammydavis yes there is a difference with the two. Permanent residency or bayaz Kimlik means you no longer need to do residency and l think you can work but not vote. citizen means you granted all that plus you can vote, BUT you have to prove you have done Military service or they will call you up, as most of us are retired you will have to pay to show you have done your bit. We have been citizens for 17 yrs having lived in the TRNC for 26 yrs. the first 18 with our own company.

[sammydavis]

Keithcaley, my word 'implying' was only my interpretation so perhaps it was as you say, merely something to do with the criteria reached in that respect or not, as the case may be. He didn't really say much at all except that 'someone' would come out and do a valuation as of time of applying for permanent resy. We will see next year, but I do agree that a huge pinch of salt is needed here for everything 'official' and even if we ever got some sort of permanent residency stamp on our passports, I would still doubt it!! We are not bothered one way or the other, just curious as to others experiences, knowing that we couldn't be the only ones to have tried for/asked about this. Thank you for all your interesting comments though.

[Keithcaley]

Sammydavis, thank you for taking the time to respond, and for clarıfying the situation.
Much appreciated.

[Catlover]

SammyDavis, I have a Beyaz Kimlik for Permanent Residency.
I managed to get this 2 years ago just after they brought it in.
There are two types - 1 for Permanent Residency only and 1 for Work Permit
With the Permanent Residency you cannot get a work permit.
The value of the house needed to be above 120,000 Euro at the time I got my kimlik.
This value is not used to calculate what percentage you pay.
DO NOT get a private evaluation of the house as this is not accepted, only one from TAPU will be accepted.
This is to ensure you have enough money "invested" in the country.
You also need to have a certain amount in the bank and they can check on this at any time (basically to ensure it is your money and you didn't just borrow it to make your account look good)
I also had to provide:
- a UK Police Report
- a Police Report from North Cyprus
- proof that I had regular monthly income (proof of pension will be enough)
- health check
- health insurance
I then had a fee to pay of about 2,000TL and this gave me a 10year kimlik.

Please Note - they can withdraw this at any time if you do not meet the conditions required for the Kimlik.
If you sell your house, do not have health insurance, do not have enough money in the bank or any other criteria are not met and they discover this then they will withdraw the Kimlik.

Things may have changed with regards to the requirements as that was 2 years ago.
Many people asked what the advantage was, to me it saved me doing my residency each year and I felt I had made the effort to become part of the community. This is my 15th year here now.

You do not have voting rights, and this is not citizenship.
I have been told some people who have Beyaz Kimliks for work permits will be allowed citizenship later but I cannot confirm this.

Hopefully that helps somewhat, but I will stress the rules may have changed from when I obtained mine so best to ask for all the details from immigration directly. Good luck. There is a lot of running around to different offices but if you are patient you get there in the end

[Catlover]

When I applied for my White Card, there were just 2 people working in the office and they had a mountain of applications.
Rules were still being sorted out so it was very stressful for them.
I was NEVER under the impression anyone would take a bribe to make it happen quicker, they were exceptionally friendly and did their best to progress applications as quickly as possible.
There were several applicants that I came across during my visits to the office and the amount of moaning and whining was embarrassing.
This is not an easy job the the staff in immigration but if you are pleasant and understanding they will be as helpful as they can.
The overall process took me about 9 months! You need patience.

[snd1966]

SammyDavis, I have a Beyaz Kimlik for Permanent Residency.
I managed to get this 2 years ago just after they brought it in.
There are two types - 1 for Permanent Residency only and 1 for Work Permit

I got my beyaz kimlik through my work permit, it was 2 years ago April 27th 2017 dated expiry 2027 but I had to return to the office, with police report, kocan,in and outs, proof of social signorta etc, i then was given the paperwork to go for a medical, this time only for typhoid, HIV and tuberculosis, not the full medical I had last time. tomorrow I am returning to find out how much money I must pay and when I have to return, I qualified for 2 years with a work permit so I assume I can be given at least this.

It was not clearly explained to me I had to do the above and the information came via other people who had the beyaz kimlik. I assumed I was ok until the expiry date

[sammydavis]

Catlover, thank you, your experiences were very interesting. Only one thing stands out - how does one get health insurance when one is too old for companies to want you???!!! So that in itself, if nothing much changes in that respect, means anyone over say 70 is not going to get Permanent Residency anyway.