The most dangerous sentence in Turkish household finance is 'we have DASK, we are covered.' DASK, the Zorunlu Deprem Sigortasi, is mandatory earthquake insurance on the building shell, priced by state tariff, capped at a state-set maximum. It does not cover your furniture, your electronics, fire that starts in your kitchen, the burst pipe that ruins the parquet, theft, or your liability when your washing machine floods the neighbor below. All of that is konut sigortasi, the voluntary home policy, and after the 2023 earthquakes made cover consciousness universal, the confusion between the two products still costs families at claim time. Here is the clean separation, and how to build the full stack from participation insurers.
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DASK: the mandatory layer, identical everywhere
DASK is a state pool product. The tariff is set by construction type, building year, area and earthquake zone, and it is identical at every insurer: there is nothing to shop on price. Cover applies to the building structure against earthquake and earthquake-triggered fire, explosion, landslide and tsunami, up to the state ceiling. The policy is required for property transactions and utility connections, so most owners have it, but two gaps surprise people. First, the ceiling: on valuable properties, DASK's maximum can sit well below rebuild cost, which is why insurers sell earthquake top-up cover above the DASK limit. Second, the scope: contents are simply not in it. A quake that leaves your building standing but destroys everything inside pays you nothing under DASK.
Because the tariff is fixed, the only DASK decision is which insurer issues it, and for participation-minded households the answer is easy: all four participation insurers (Neova, Bereket, Turkiye Katilim, HDI Katilim) issue DASK at the state price, so issue it where you hold your konut policy. One honest structural note our readers deserve: DASK's pool economics are the state's, not a tekaful fund. Its central investments are not participation-screened, and no insurer can change that. Turkish scholars treat mandatory state schemes as necessity; the voluntary layers are where participation structure actually operates. We make the same point about MTPL in our trafik guide.
Konut sigortasi: the voluntary layer where cover actually lives
A participation konut policy typically covers: fire and explosion, theft, water installation damage, storm and flood, electrical damage, glass breakage, contents and (depending on package) building above DASK scope, neighbor and tenant liability, and emergency home assistance services. Neova's konut product runs this full set with a quake top-up available above the DASK ceiling; Bereket's Bereketli Konut package adds the Deprem Destek top-up and the Bakimli Evim assistance product; Turkiye Katilim's Konut Katilim is designed around the home financing desks of the state participation banks; HDI Katilim's konut cover is aggregator-quotable alongside its DASK. The committee-approved wordings and interest-free premium handling are what make these participation products; the cover mechanics track the wider market.
The stack, assembled
| Layer | What it does | Where it comes from |
|---|---|---|
| DASK | Building shell vs earthquake, to the state ceiling | Mandatory; state tariff; any insurer, price identical |
| Konut policy | Contents, fire, theft, water, storm, liability, assistance | Voluntary; quote-based; shop the participation insurers |
| Earthquake top-up | Building and contents value above the DASK ceiling | Voluntary; add-on at Neova, Bereket and others |
The underinsurance trap nobody escapes passively
Turkish inflation makes contents underinsurance the default outcome of doing nothing. The sum insured you declared two years ago may be far below today's replacement cost of the same sofa, television and kitchen; at claim time, you are paid against the declared sum, not the real one. The discipline: update sums insured at every renewal, deliberately, using current replacement prices. Same for the building top-up: rebuild costs move with construction inflation, and the DASK ceiling covers less of your rebuild every year that you leave the top-up unreviewed. This is the single highest-value fifteen minutes in home insurance.
How to buy it, participation-style
- Quote the konut package from at least Neova, Bereket and Turkiye Katilim on the same specification (building value, contents sum, province). Konut pricing is quote-based everywhere; the spread is real.
- Issue DASK with whichever insurer wins the konut business; there is no price difference, and one insurer for both simplifies claims after a quake, when you least want coordination problems.
- Price the earthquake top-up explicitly if your rebuild cost exceeds the DASK ceiling, which in cities it very often does.
- Confirm assistance service scope in writing (plumber call-outs, locksmith, emergency repairs), especially outside metropolitan areas where service networks thin out.
- If your home is financed at a participation bank, the branch will pre-fill the house insurer's konut policy at the financing desk; take the quote, then compare anyway. Bank-channel home policies are where Turkish customers most reliably overpay.
Bottom line
DASK is the law and the floor; konut is the actual protection; the top-up is what makes the earthquake math whole. After 2023, home cover is the least optional insurance in Turkey after MTPL, and the participation market lets you build the entire stack without a conventional insurer: committee-approved konut wordings, interest-free premium handling, DASK issued at the same state price everyone pays. Full home products and comparisons are in our participation home insurance guide and on the takaful hub. Check your sums insured this week; inflation already did.
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Quick answers to the questions people actually ask
- Is DASK enough for a renter? DASK is the owner's obligation and covers the building; a renter's furniture and electronics need a contents-only konut policy, which is cheap and skipped by almost everyone.
- Does konut cover earthquake? The base konut policy typically covers fire, theft, water and storm; earthquake cover for contents and value above the DASK ceiling comes through the quake top-up. Ask explicitly; do not assume.
- Can I buy konut without DASK? In practice DASK is checked at transactions and utility connections, and insurers expect it in place. Buy both, from the same participation insurer, and let one claims call handle a quake.
- Is there a religious problem with DASK? Scholars treat the mandatory state pool as necessity; the committee-supervised konut and top-up layers are where participation structure genuinely operates.