The price first, because it is the pleasant surprise of Turkish estate planning: at the 2026 Ministry of Justice tariff, a resmi vasiyetname (official notary will) costs 2,661.62 TL for the deed plus 80.68 TL per page of writing, with revocation or amendment at one third of the deed fee (887.21 TL) and a 319.60 TL travel allowance if the notary attends your home or hospital. A typical will lands around 3,000 TL all-in. Published to the kurus, identical at every notary, no fee ambush possible. For a document that prevents the most expensive category of family dispute that exists, it is one of the best purchases in Turkish law. Here is everything else you need to know.
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Why the notary form, specifically
Turkish law recognizes other will forms, including the handwritten (holographic) will, but the notary form is effectively mandatory for reliability: it is drafted with a notary's supervision, executed before two witnesses, capacity-checked (elderly testators may need a medical report), centrally registered through the notarial system, and opened automatically by the civil court after death. A handwritten will saves the fee and gambles the estate on the document being found, accepted and unchallenged. The registration alone decides this: wills that nobody finds do not exist, and the Turkiye Noterler Birligi infrastructure is Turkey's entire formal wills system. There is no commercial Islamic will service in the country to compare against; the notary is the whole market, a gap we examine in its own article.
The process, step by step
- 1. Prepare the content before the appointment: what goes to whom within the disposable portion, guardianship wishes, debt and funeral instructions. For Muslims, this preparation starts with a free Diyanet consultation on shares and the wasiyya limit; our (Diyanet guide) covers the channels.
- 2. Book a notary appointment and bring identification; two witnesses are required at execution. Elderly testators should expect a capacity verification step, possibly including a medical report.
- 3. The notary drafts the will as a formal deed, reads it with you, and executes it before the witnesses. The per-page fee (80.68 TL) makes concision cheap; most wills run a few pages.
- 4. The will is centrally registered. After death, the civil court opens it automatically; no family member needs to find or produce it.
- 5. Amend at life events: marriages, births, property changes. Amendment or revocation costs 887.21 TL, one third of the deed fee, which is deliberately cheap so plans stay current.
- 6. Housebound or hospitalized? The notary travels for a fixed 319.60 TL allowance. There is no excuse a family cannot overcome for under 4,000 TL total.
The Diyanet consultation referenced above is free and worth doing first: our guide to the fatwa channels explains Alo 190, written applications and provincial mufti offices.
What a Muslim testator should put in it
| Item | Why it belongs in the will |
|---|---|
| Charitable bequests and gifts to non-heirs (the wasiyya third) | The Islamic one-third bequest to non-heirs fits comfortably inside the civil disposable portion; this is the will's religious payload |
| Guardianship wishes for minor children | The single most consequential instruction for young families, and the one most often left to chance |
| Debt inventory and payment instructions | Debts come off the estate before division in both systems; listing them prevents both non-payment and dispute |
| Mahr acknowledgment | An unpaid mahr is a debt of the estate; documenting it protects the widow's claim |
| Funeral and burial instructions | Legally persuasive and practically decisive in the first 48 hours |
| A statement of faraid intent (accompanying, or within) | Not enforceable against reserved shares, but it anchors the TMK 676 heir agreement the family will need; see below |
The one thing it cannot do
A notary will cannot impose faraid shares against the Civil Code's reserved share protections. Descendants are protected at half their statutory share and the spouse at up to the full statutory share, and a will that divides 2:1 between son and daughter invites a tenkis abatement claim from the shortchanged heir, available within one year of learning of the violation. The notary will drafts around this reality, not through it: it directs the disposable portion, documents intent, and leaves the faraid division to the mechanism that actually works, the unanimous heir agreement under TMK 676 that Diyanet endorses. The full legal picture is in Islamic inheritance under Turkish law; the agreement mechanics are in the TMK 676 guide.
Practical notes from the real world
- Language and formality run in Turkish; foreign-resident testators should arrange translation support before the appointment, and cross-border assets need advice beyond the notary's scope.
- The notary provides no Shariah input whatsoever; bring the Diyanet ruling with you, worked out for your actual family configuration.
- Two wills (spouses) means two deeds and two fees; there is no joint will discount, and mirror-image planning still needs individual documents.
- Keep a copy of the deed with your family documents anyway; registration makes the original findable, but heirs act faster when they know what exists.
- Update discipline beats drafting perfection: an amendment costs 887.21 TL, a stale will costs whatever the forgotten asset or the pre-divorce beneficiary costs.
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Bottom line
Budget about 3,000 TL and an afternoon. The resmi vasiyetname executes everything Turkish law lets a Muslim testator direct: the wasiyya third, guardianship, debts, mahr, funeral wishes, in the strongest evidentiary form available, centrally registered and court-opened automatically. Pair it with a Diyanet ruling on the religious math and a family prepared for the TMK 676 agreement, and the Islamic estate plan is complete; skip it, and civil intestacy plus family improvisation take over. The complete checklist sequences the whole plan; the estate planning hub has the tools.