A common misconception in Turkish divorce and matrimonial property disputes is that a real estate asset becomes untouchable once it is registered in the name of a company.
The scenario is increasingly common.
One spouse owns or controls a limited liability company or joint-stock company. During the marriage, the company purchases an apartment, office, commercial unit, land, villa, warehouse or other valuable real estate. The title deed does not show the spouse as the owner. Instead, the registered owner is the company.
When divorce begins, the other spouse discovers the property and asks:
“The property was bought during our marriage, but it is registered in my spouse’s company’s name. Can I claim half of it?”
The short answer under Turkish law is:
The other spouse will normally not have a direct ownership claim over the company-owned property. However, this does not necessarily mean that the economic value of the property escapes matrimonial property liquidation.
The distinction between the company’s assets and the spouse’s shares in the company is therefore one of the most important issues in high-value matrimonial property litigation.
1. The First Rule: The Company and the Shareholder Are Legally Separate
Turkish commercial companies have legal personality separate from their shareholders.
Under Article 125 of the Turkish Commercial Code, commercial companies have legal personality and may independently acquire rights and undertake obligations. Therefore, if an apartment is registered in the name of a limited liability company, the legal owner of the apartment is the company — not the shareholder spouse personally.
This distinction has recently been expressly emphasised by the Turkish Court of Cassation.
In its decision dated 4 February 2025, the Second Civil Chamber of the Court of Cassation held that, in matrimonial property liquidation proceedings, the relevant assets are generally the defendant spouse’s company shares and the financial rights attached to those shares, rather than individual assets registered in the company’s name.
The Court expressly stated that the company has a separate legal personality and is considered a third party in relation to the matrimonial property dispute.
This principle changes the entire litigation strategy.
If a husband owns 100% of Company X and Company X owns a TRY 30 million apartment, the wife cannot simply argue:
“My husband owns the company, therefore he owns the apartment, and I want half of the apartment.”
Legally, that reasoning is incomplete.
The company owns the apartment.
The husband owns the company shares.
The matrimonial property claim will therefore generally focus on the economic value of the husband’s shares rather than directly dividing the apartment.
2. The Real Question Is Not Who Owns the Property — It Is What the Company Shares Are Worth
This distinction does not necessarily disadvantage the other spouse.
Suppose a husband owns 100% of a company.
The company has:
TRY 5 million in cash,
TRY 2 million in equipment,
a commercial property worth TRY 25 million,
and liabilities of TRY 7 million.
The spouse’s company shares may consequently represent a substantial economic value.
If those shares constitute acquired property within the meaning of the Turkish Civil Code, their value may be taken into consideration when calculating the other spouse’s participation claim.
The commercial property therefore does not simply disappear from the matrimonial property analysis because the title deed is registered in the company’s name.
Instead, its economic value may be reflected indirectly in the market value of the company and consequently in the value of the shareholder spouse’s shares.
This is the central practical principle:
Company-owned real estate is normally not divided directly between spouses, but it may substantially increase the value of the company shares that are subject to matrimonial property liquidation.
3. Was the Company Established During the Marriage?
The next question is extremely important.
Under Article 219 of the Turkish Civil Code, acquired property generally includes assets acquired for consideration during the matrimonial property regime. Article 220, on the other hand, identifies categories of personal property, including assets already owned when the matrimonial property regime began.
Consider two different situations.
Company Established During the Marriage
Assume that the spouses married in 2014.
The husband established a company in 2017 using income earned from his professional activities.
The company later purchased a valuable commercial property.
The divorce action was filed in 2026.
Subject to the source of funds and other circumstances, the husband’s company shares may constitute acquired property.
The other spouse does not automatically become the owner of 50% of those shares.
Instead, the value attributable to the shares may enter the calculation of the matrimonial estate and ultimately produce a monetary participation claim.
This is an important distinction.
Turkish matrimonial property law normally grants the creditor spouse a personal monetary claim rather than automatic ownership of half of each matrimonial asset. The Court of Cassation has expressly reiterated that, except for limited statutory exceptions, matrimonial property liquidation creates a personal claim rather than an ownership right.
4. What If the Company Was Established Before the Marriage?
This situation requires a different analysis.
Suppose the husband established the company in 2010 and married in 2015.
His shares existed before the matrimonial property regime began.
Those shares will generally be characterised as his personal property under Article 220 of the Turkish Civil Code.
Does this mean that the other spouse can never make any claim connected with the company?
No.
The distinction between the underlying share and the income generated by that share is critical.
Article 219 of the Turkish Civil Code generally treats income generated from personal property as acquired property, unless the spouses validly agree otherwise under Article 221.
The General Assembly of Civil Chambers of the Court of Cassation addressed this issue in its decision E. 2020/8-458, K. 2021/889, dated 1 July 2021.
The Court confirmed that company shares acquired before marriage constitute personal property. However, income attributable to those shares during the period between marriage and termination of the matrimonial property regime may constitute acquired property and may therefore be examined in matrimonial property liquidation proceedings.
This can become particularly significant where the company accumulated substantial profits during the marriage.
5. What If the Company Does Not Distribute Its Profits?
This is one of the most important issues in cases involving wealthy business owners.
Imagine that the spouse owns a company established before marriage.
Instead of distributing profits every year, the company retains them.
Those profits are then used to purchase:
real estate,
vehicles,
new machinery,
another company,
financial investments,
or additional commercial assets.
The shareholder spouse may argue:
“The company is my personal property. It never paid me dividends. Therefore, my spouse has no claim.”
That argument should not automatically be accepted.
The Court of Cassation’s approach requires examination of income attributable to the shares during the matrimonial property regime. In the 2021 General Assembly decision, the Court specifically required investigation of the income corresponding to the shareholder spouse’s company interest during the marriage.
Accordingly, lawyers should investigate not only dividends actually transferred into the spouse’s personal bank account but also the company’s retained profits, reserves, reinvestments and changes in capital structure.
This area is particularly sensitive to expert accounting evidence.
There is also a major danger of double counting.
If retained earnings and real estate have already increased the market value of the company and the expert values the spouse’s shares using a method that captures those assets and profits, the same economic value should not simply be added again as a separate matrimonial asset.
The valuation methodology must therefore be carefully reviewed.
6. Example: The Company Buys an Apartment During the Marriage
Consider the following example.
The spouses marry in 2016.
The husband establishes ABC Ltd. in 2018 and owns 100% of its shares.
The company becomes profitable.
In 2022, ABC Ltd. purchases an apartment for TRY 8 million.
By the time the divorce action is filed in 2026, the apartment is worth TRY 30 million.
The title deed belongs to ABC Ltd.
The wife cannot normally demand registration of 50% of the apartment directly in her name solely on the basis of the matrimonial property regime.
However, if the husband’s shares are acquired property, the value of those shares must be considered.
When the company is valued, the TRY 30 million property may form an important part of the company’s overall economic value.
If ABC Ltd. is worth TRY 40 million after taking its assets and liabilities into account and the husband owns 100% of it, the relevant economic focus may be the value of his shareholding.
The participation claim is then calculated within the broader matrimonial property liquidation framework.
In other words:
The wife does not necessarily claim the apartment. She claims against the economic value represented by the husband’s company interest.
7. Company Valuation Is Usually the Real Battlefield
Once company shares become relevant to matrimonial property liquidation, the dispute frequently turns into a valuation case.
The Court of Cassation has made clear that merely looking at the nominal share capital or book equity of a company may be insufficient.
According to Court of Cassation case law, valuation may require consideration of the company’s financial statements, business sector, growth rate, technology, machinery, customer portfolio, competitive strength, cash flows, financial position, dividend policy, investments and other factors affecting its market value. Expert assistance may be necessary.
This is particularly important where the company owns real estate.
A company may have registered capital of only TRY 1 million while owning land worth TRY 100 million.
Using only nominal capital would therefore produce a completely unrealistic result.
Likewise, book values in company records may not reflect current market values.
A building purchased fifteen years earlier may remain recorded at a historical accounting value while its actual market value has increased dramatically.
The lawyer representing the non-shareholder spouse should therefore insist that material company-owned real estate be identified and properly valued as part of the company valuation exercise.
8. The Company’s Debts Must Also Be Considered
The opposite mistake is equally dangerous.
Suppose a company owns a property worth TRY 50 million.
It would be incorrect to automatically conclude that the spouse’s shares are therefore worth TRY 50 million.
The company may also have:
substantial bank loans,
commercial debts,
tax liabilities,
employee liabilities,
mortgages,
shareholder loans,
litigation exposure,
or other financial obligations.
Corporate valuation must therefore consider both assets and liabilities.
For example, if the company purchased the property with a TRY 40 million bank loan that remains outstanding, the net economic effect of the property is very different from a debt-free property worth TRY 50 million.
A properly prepared matrimonial property case should therefore analyse the company as an economic whole rather than simply adding up isolated assets.
9. What If the Spouse Owns Only Part of the Company?
The same principles apply where the spouse is not the sole shareholder.
Suppose the husband owns only 40% of the company.
His wife cannot treat all company assets as though they belonged to him personally.
The rights of the other shareholders must be respected.
The relevant issue is the economic value of the husband’s 40% interest and the financial rights attached to that shareholding.
This makes trade registry records particularly important.
A matrimonial property lawyer should identify not only what assets the company owns but also:
who the shareholders are,
what percentage each shareholder holds,
when those shares were acquired,
whether capital increases occurred,
whether shares were transferred before divorce,
and whether the shareholder structure changed during the marriage.
10. What If the Property Was Deliberately Put in the Company’s Name to Defeat the Other Spouse?
This is where the case becomes more complicated.
There is an important difference between:
a genuine corporate acquisition
and
a structure deliberately created to remove matrimonial assets from the other spouse’s reach.
For example, suppose a husband personally owns an apartment acquired during marriage.
After divorce discussions begin, he transfers the apartment to a company he controls for an artificially low price.
Alternatively, he transfers substantial marital funds into the company immediately before divorce and the company then purchases real estate.
In such circumstances, counsel should investigate whether the transaction was designed to reduce the other spouse’s participation claim.
Article 229 of the Turkish Civil Code provides mechanisms for adding certain transfers back into the calculation where a spouse has made dispositions intended to reduce the other spouse’s participation claim.
The Court of Cassation has confirmed that transactions made with the purposes described in Article 229 may be treated as though the relevant value remained within the matrimonial estate for calculation purposes.
Depending on the facts, rules concerning simulated transactions, abuse of rights and the separate legal personality of the company may also require analysis.
However, the existence of a company alone is not enough to establish asset concealment.
The claimant should demonstrate the suspicious economic circumstances surrounding the transaction.
11. Can an Interim Injunction Be Placed Directly on the Company’s Property?
This is a particularly important procedural question.
The Court of Cassation gave a clear answer in its decision of 4 February 2025, Second Civil Chamber, E. 2025/49, K. 2025/923.
The Court resolved conflicting regional appellate court decisions and held that, in a matrimonial property liquidation dispute, assets registered in the name of a company with separate legal personality generally cannot be subjected to an interim injunction merely because the defendant spouse owns shares in that company.
The Court reasoned that the company is a separate third party, while the assets relevant to matrimonial liquidation are the shareholder spouse’s shares and financial rights attached to those shares.
This is highly important in practice.
A lawyer should not automatically request an injunction over every apartment, vehicle or commercial property owned by the spouse’s company.
Instead, protective measures should be designed around assets that legally belong to the spouse, particularly the company shares and other personal assets, subject to the requirements of Turkish procedural law.
12. What Documents Should Be Investigated?
In high-value disputes involving corporate real estate, the title deed alone tells only a small part of the story.
The lawyer should reconstruct the financial history of the company.
Particular attention should be paid to trade registry records, shareholding history, incorporation documents, capital increases, share transfers, company balance sheets, income statements, general ledger records, corporate bank accounts, shareholder current accounts, general assembly resolutions, dividend decisions, retained earnings, property purchase contracts, title deed records, mortgages, bank financing and related-party transactions.
The key question should always be:
Where did the money used to acquire the property actually come from?
If the company legitimately purchased the property from its own commercial income, the analysis will primarily concern company and share valuation.
If the purchase price came directly from the shareholder spouse’s matrimonial assets, additional matrimonial property issues may arise.
If funds were moved immediately before divorce and the transactions appear commercially irrational, Article 229 and asset-concealment arguments may become increasingly important.
13. A Practical Example: A TRY 50 Million Office Registered to the Husband’s Company
Assume the spouses married in 2013.
The husband established a construction company in 2016 using earnings accumulated during the marriage.
He owns 100% of the company.
In 2020, the company purchased an office.
The office is worth approximately TRY 50 million when matrimonial litigation begins.
The company also owns machinery worth TRY 10 million and has TRY 15 million in liabilities.
The husband argues:
“The office does not belong to me. It belongs to the company. My wife cannot claim anything.”
The first sentence may be legally correct.
The second may not be.
The wife cannot normally demand 50% registration of the office merely because her husband owns the company.
But the husband’s shares may themselves constitute acquired property.
The company-owned office will affect the company’s value.
The company’s other assets and liabilities will also affect that value.
The husband’s shareholding can therefore represent a substantial matrimonial property value.
The lawyer’s job is not necessarily to attack the title deed.
The more effective strategy may be to obtain the corporate records, establish the proper value of the company and calculate the spouse’s participation claim based on the shareholder spouse’s economic interest.
14. What If the Company Existed Before Marriage but Bought the Property During Marriage?
This situation requires particularly careful analysis.
The fact that the company existed before marriage does not automatically mean that every economic benefit created during the marriage is outside the matrimonial property regime.
The spouse’s original shares may remain personal property.
However, profits attributable to those shares during the marriage may qualify as acquired property.
The Court of Cassation General Assembly has expressly recognised that income corresponding to premarital company shares during the matrimonial property regime may become relevant to liquidation.
Therefore, if a premarital company accumulated significant profits during marriage and used those profits to purchase valuable real estate, the financial records must be examined carefully.
The correct claim may not be:
“I own half the building.”
It may instead be:
“The income generated during the matrimonial regime and the economic value created through the company must be properly identified and included in the matrimonial liquidation calculation.”
That distinction can determine whether a multimillion-lira claim succeeds or fails.
15. Final Takeaway
Registering real estate in a company’s name does not automatically remove its economic value from a Turkish matrimonial property dispute.
But the legal route is different from a case in which the apartment is directly registered in the spouse’s personal name.
Where a company owns the property, the court must respect the company’s separate legal personality.
Accordingly, the other spouse generally cannot directly demand half of the company-owned apartment, land, office or commercial property.
The real focus is normally on:
the shareholder spouse’s company shares,
the legal classification of those shares as acquired or personal property,
the income generated by those shares during marriage,
the company’s actual economic value,
and whether suspicious transfers were made to reduce the other spouse’s matrimonial claim.
In high-value divorces involving companies, the most important question is therefore not:
“Whose name is written on the title deed?”
It is:
“Who owns the company, when were those shares acquired, where did the company’s money come from, and how much was the shareholder spouse’s economic interest actually worth when the matrimonial property regime ended?”
A property registered to a company may be legally separated from the spouse.
Its economic value, however, may still sit at the centre of the divorce.
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