Central Bank of Turkey Governor Hafize Gaye Erkan decided to move with her family to her parents’ house given the high price of real estate in Istanbul, Turkish daily Hürriyet reported today.
“We couldn’t find a house in Istanbul. Everything is very expensive. We moved to my mother’s house,” explains the 44-year-old banker, who has a long career in investment banking in the United States.
Erkan returned to Turkey from the United States in June this year to head the Turkish central bank.
Since then, the country has raised interest rates several times, up to 40%, in an effort to curb galloping inflation.
Last November, annual inflation in Turkey was 61%, although independent experts estimate it is actually twice as high.
“How is it possible that Istanbul is more expensive than Manhattan?” asks the governor of the Turkish central bank, who worked in the United States for twenty years at Goldman Sachs and First Republic Bank.
Rents in Istanbul are even rising above the official inflation rate, due to the lack of new construction despite the high costs.
Source: DN
