Turkey used household goods customs depend on who owns the goods. If you are a Turkish national who has spent two straight years in another country, or five years out of the past ten, your used furniture goes in free of customs duty with the consulate’s relocation certificate, provided the goods land in a window running from two months before the owner arrives to six months after. If you are a foreigner making Turkey your home, your belongings enter once you show a current ikamet or work permit, your number at the Turkish tax office, and either a notary-stamped rental contract running twelve months or more or the tapu for a property you own; without those, entry is temporary against a bank security, or the taxes are paid. Anything new pays duty plus 20% VAT. At Gulf International Shipping we build the exemption file with you before the container is loaded and ship the household by sea from any Saudi city: bedroom sets begin at SAR 920, each cubic metre in a shared box at SAR 410, and a private twenty-footer at SAR 4,140.
This guide is written for the three groups who call us most. Turkish families who have spent years in the Kingdom and are heading back to Bursa, Konya or Istanbul. Arab families who now hold Turkish residence and would rather take their furniture than buy everything again. And students and individuals sending boxes to themselves or relatives. The rules differ sharply between these groups, and misreading them can leave a container sitting at a Turkish port for weeks, or mean paying tax on furniture that could have entered free. The conditions below follow Turkish customs regulations as explained by Turkish consulates and professional customs bodies; we confirm them with the broker before every shipment because they can be amended.
The essentials
- Returning Turkish citizen: no customs duty after 24 months abroad, with a relocation certificate, once per household
- Arrival window: from 2 months before you enter Turkey to 6 months after, with a second lot allowed inside it
- Foreign resident: for permanent entry: residence or work permit, Turkish tax number, a year-long notarised lease or a title deed
- New items: duty by tariff heading, then 20% VAT; anything still in its original box counts as new
- TVs and radios: the bandrol broadcasting fee applies even inside an exempt household
- Phones: not accepted by post or courier, so carry them yourself
- Freight prices: entry rates of SAR 920 per bedroom, SAR 410 per shared m³ and SAR 4,140 per private twenty-footer
The exemption is claimed at the Turkish port in your presence · we prepare the file in the Kingdom · phone and WhatsApp 0568829975
Where do you stand with Turkish customs? Three situations, three outcomes
The first thing the broker at a Turkish port wants to know is not what is in the container but who it belongs to: who you are, where you have been living, and why these goods are coming in. Your answer puts you in one of three situations, each with its own documents and result:
Nationality alone is not enough. A Turkish citizen who goes home on holiday and returns to a job in the Kingdom gains nothing from the relocation exemption, because the condition is a permanent move. An Arab visitor on a short tourist permit is not treated like a settled resident with a long lease. That is why our first call with you covers your situation in detail before we suggest a shipping date.
Situation one: a Turkish citizen coming home to settle
Time spent outside Turkey
The right to the exemption starts once a Turkish citizen has completed two full years, 24 months, living in another country without a break. Short trips to Turkey during that period do not break it as long as they add up to less than six months a year, but they are not counted as time abroad either. There is also an alternative for people whose stays abroad were interrupted: having lived outside Turkey for at least five of the last ten years. A Turkish family that has lived in Riyadh, Jeddah or Dammam for a decade usually qualifies comfortably; someone who moved to the Kingdom recently should count the months carefully before deciding to ship.
The relocation certificate from the consulate
The core document in a returnee’s file is the relocation certificate, known in Turkish as the ikamet nakil belgesi, issued by the Turkish mission in the country where you have been living. In the Kingdom that means the embassy in Riyadh, or the consulate general in Jeddah for those in the west. It usually travels with the detailed family civil registry extract (vukuatlı nüfus kayıt örneği), the entry and exit record printed from the e-Devlet portal, your passport, the inventory, and a notarised mandate for the customs broker at the port.
One right per household, with conditions on the goods
The exemption belongs to the household as a whole, not to each person in it, so a husband and wife cannot each ship a separate exempt home. What you bring has to be second-hand, belong to you, and serve the same purpose in the new home as it did in the old one. Anyone who has used the exemption and wants it again must first live abroad for a fresh 24 months. Exempt goods are for your household, not for sale or commercial use.
Being there for clearance
The owner is expected to attend clearance at the Turkish port in person, or at the very least to have entered Turkey before the procedure begins, because the customs officer checks your entry date against the container’s arrival. We plan your attendance with you so the container does not sit waiting after it lands.
Situation two: an Arab or other foreign resident settling in Turkey
A large share of the people we move are Syrian, Egyptian, Yemeni, Jordanian and other families who lived in the Kingdom and have since obtained Turkish residence. They cannot use the returning citizen’s exemption, but Turkish customs offer them three ways to bring used furniture in:
Permanent entry is usually the easier path. Get your tax number at the nearest tax office in Turkey, a quick formality, and ask the landlord to have the lease certified by a notary (noter) for at least a year. If you have bought a flat, the title deed (tapu) does the job instead of a lease. You will also need your original passport, a detailed inventory, the original bill of lading, and your Turkish entry and exit record for the last two years. Timing works much as it does for returnees: the goods are expected in a window opening two months before your latest entry and closing six months after it.
Sort the Turkish paperwork before booking the container
The notarised lease and the tax number are obtained in Turkey, not in the Kingdom. If you are still in Riyadh or Jeddah, ask a relative or a lawyer in Turkey to handle them under a power of attorney, or travel first and let us send the container once the papers are ready.
Situation three: students, visitors and people sending to family
If you are not moving residence, your goods are treated as an ordinary import and charged duty according to their type, plus VAT. Most of these shipments are small: clothes, books, gifts and a few devices. A duty-paid postal or courier parcel is allowed up to 30 kg gross as long as it is not commercial; anything heavier goes through full clearance like any other cargo. A student on a study permit who is shipping the furniture of a room should check their own position first, because students’ circumstances vary. Weight bands and prices for boxes sit on our page about cartons and parcels shipping to Turkey.
The arrival window: when to ship and when your goods must land
Timing, more than paperwork, is what loses most exemptions. Your goods must reach the Turkish port within a window that opens two months before you enter Turkey and closes six months after. Since a container needs roughly two to five weeks from your home in the Kingdom to the Turkish port, the dates have to be planned from day one:
For example, a family in Jeddah plans to fly to Istanbul at the start of the month. We load the container a week before they leave, it reaches Ambarlı roughly three to four weeks later, and by then the family has entered Turkey and settled into temporary accommodation; they attend clearance and receive their furniture. Had we loaded three months before their flight, the goods would have landed more than two months ahead of their owner, outside the window.
The inventory Turkish customs will accept
Everything in an exemption claim hangs on the inventory. Turkish customs do not accept vague entries such as “household furniture” or “personal effects”; they want to know what is in each carton. So we write the list room by room, give each carton a number that matches its line on the list, note make, model and serial for each electrical item, and state the quantity and that the items are used. We also photograph each appliance’s rating plate during packing, so that if an inspector asks about a number we can go straight to the picture.
- List electrical appliances one by one, fridge, washer, TV, air conditioner and oven, each with brand and serial number.
- Do not repeat the same appliance beyond what one household needs; three televisions in a small flat attract attention.
- Name furniture clearly: a bedroom of bed, wardrobe and dressing table; a three-piece sofa set; and so on.
- Keep books, clothes and kitchenware in separate cartons labelled with their contents.
- Sign the list and keep a copy with you on the plane.
Used versus new: where does the exemption stop?
In every situation the exemption covers used goods only. Customs regard any appliance still sealed in the shop packaging as new, however long ago you bought it, and new goods pay customs duty under their tariff heading followed by 20% VAT. The same applies to duplicate electrical items beyond a household’s needs. Our advice is to unpack new appliances and use them for a while before shipping, or simply buy them in Turkey after you arrive.
Even inside an exempt household, TV and radio sets attract the bandrol, Turkey’s broadcasting fee. Some things do not count as household goods at all: jewellery and precious stones, which you should carry; food and alcohol; drones; plants and animals; flammables such as aerosols, gas cylinders and paint; and medicines without a prescription. Cosmetics and cleaning products are accepted in normal household quantities, not commercial ones.
Phones and smart devices: keep them with you
Turkey refuses handsets sent through the post or by express courier, with or without duty paid, and the safest course is not to put any phone among your furniture cartons at all; carry it in your hand luggage. Remember too that a foreign handset is allowed onto Turkish networks only for a set number of days; after that, its IMEI needs registering and a fee is due, so ask about this in your first days there. Used laptops and tablets travel with the furniture if their number suits the size of the family and they appear on the list.
Cars sit outside the household exemption
Cars follow an entirely separate regime in Turkey. Returning citizens may bring one private car whose model year is no older than three years, provided it was in their own name abroad for six months or longer before they last entered Turkey; they must declare it within six months of entering, and the right is available once in five years. Even with customs duty waived, the special consumption tax ÖTV and VAT remain due, and on large engines they can be very high. For a foreign resident, a car is admitted only temporarily, until the permit runs out. If your car qualifies, we wrap it and secure it inside a closed container leaving Jeddah, starting at SAR 5,060, with Turkish taxes payable separately; car shipping from Saudi Arabia to Turkey walks through every case.
At the Turkish port: inspection and clearance
Furniture containers for southern and central Turkey arrive at Mersin, and those for Istanbul, Bursa and the surrounding area at the Marmara ports. There the broker files the papers in your name under the notarised mandate, and the customs officer sets an inspection date. The container may be opened and a number of cartons checked against the list, or one particular carton may be opened. Clearance of used household goods normally takes 4–5 working days when the file is complete, longer if a document is missing.
Every day the container stays at the port beyond the free period incurs storage charges, which is why we make sure your file is ready before the vessel docks. The voyage from Jeddah to each Turkish port is traced step by step: sea freight from Saudi Arabia to Turkey, and clearance is priced by shipment value under our customs clearance service.
What it costs to ship used furniture to Turkey
The exemption saves you Turkish duty, but the cost of moving the goods remains, and it depends on the size of the home, the loading city and the Turkish destination. These are Gulf International Shipping’s entry prices for furniture, set below the lowest rates published by companies shipping to Turkey for the same items:
Note: a furniture container reaches the door in roughly 14–34 days depending on your Saudi city and Turkish destination, and a shared container takes five to seven days longer. These prices start from Jeddah and Makkah, closest to the loading port, and rise for Riyadh, the Eastern Province and Tabuk; each city’s table is listed under shipping prices from Saudi Arabia to Turkey.
Air freight for what you need the moment you arrive
While the furniture is at sea, a family needs a few things in its first days: seasonal clothes, school papers, basic kitchen items and prescribed medicines. These travel in the holds of flights to Istanbul from the Kingdom’s main airports and arrive in 3–5 working days, with air freight from SAR 14 a kilo. If these items are part of the exempt household, they go on the same inventory and are presented with the air waybill within the window. Do not put loose lithium batteries or large quantities of cosmetics in an air shipment. Each Saudi airport’s flights and timings are listed under air freight from Saudi Arabia to Turkey.
Steps to move your home to Turkey with an exemption file
- 1Tell us your situation
Are you a returning Turkish citizen, a foreign resident, or just sending goods? And when do you plan to enter Turkey? - 2Get the key document
Returnees obtain the relocation certificate; residents obtain their tax number and have the lease notarised. - 3Survey and volume
We look over the home or your photos, recommend shared space or a whole box, and price it. - 4Inventory and packing
We list everything room by room, photograph appliances with their serial numbers and pack for the sea. - 5Loading and export
The container is loaded on a date that fits the window, the export declaration is lodged on Fasah, and it sails from Jeddah. - 6Clearance with you present
You enter Turkey, the broker files under your mandate, and you attend the inspection if asked. - 7Delivery and set-up
A truck to your new flat, unpacking, and furniture assembled in place.
What makes customs refuse the exemption on your furniture?
- The container arriving more than two months before you enter Turkey, or more than six months after.
- Less than 24 months abroad, or long visits to Turkey that broke the period.
- No relocation certificate, a lease that is not notarised, or a resident’s lease shorter than a year.
- New appliances in their original boxes, or many duplicate devices.
- A generic list with no brands or serial numbers, or cartons without numbers.
- Your name on the bill of lading not matching your passport.
- Claiming the exemption a second time for the same household before a new period abroad.
Delivery to your new home in Turkey
Once released, the furniture goes by truck from the port to your address: Istanbul on either shore, Bursa and Yalova via Gemlik, Sakarya and Kocaeli, Ankara via Mersin, and Antalya, İzmir and Trabzon. The crew removes the packing, assembles beds and wardrobes, and drops every box in the room marked on its label. In modern residential complexes we arrange the lift booking and truck parking with building management in advance.
If a whole household is on the move, two more pages help: furniture moving from Saudi Arabia to Turkey, which covers packing methods and container sizes, and shipping company from Saudi Arabia to Turkey for the full picture of routes and transit times.
We prepare your furniture exemption file before loading
Tell us your status in Turkey, your travel date and your city, and we will send the document list, the cost and a loading date that fits the window.
Related topics
- Start with the big picture, shipping company from Saudi Arabia to Turkey, then go deeper into household moves via furniture moving from Saudi Arabia to Turkey
- Owners of a car should open car shipping from Saudi Arabia to Turkey; people with just a few boxes, cartons and parcels shipping to Turkey
- How containers travel: sea freight from Saudi Arabia to Turkey. Flights for urgent things: air freight from Saudi Arabia to Turkey. Rates by city: shipping prices from Saudi Arabia to Turkey
- Living in the capital? See shipping from Riyadh to Turkey. Near the port? See shipping from Jeddah to Turkey. In Khobar, Dhahran or Al-Ahsa? See shipping from Dammam to Turkey
- Families in the holy cities can use shipping from Makkah to Turkey or shipping from Madinah to Turkey; the mountain city has shipping from Taif to Turkey; the north-west has shipping from Tabuk to Turkey
- General services: furniture moving abroad and customs clearance; you can also request a quote or browse all destinations
