Buying a home in Israel from abroad

Yes. Israeli law places no restriction on a foreigner buying a privately owned apartment or house. The one restriction in the law concerns “Israel Lands” — land owned by the state, the Development Authority or the Jewish National Fund and managed by the Israel Land Authority, which is where many homes sit on a long lease rather than outright ownership.

• On Israel Lands, transferring ownership or a lease of more than five years to a “foreigner” needs the Authority's approval. A deal made without it has no effect and is not registered.
• “Foreigner” here means a person who is not an Israeli citizen, not an Israeli resident, and not entitled to immigrate under the Law of Return. A buyer abroad who is eligible for aliyah is therefore not a foreigner for this rule.
• For everyone else there is a short route: the Authority's director may approve a foreign individual buying one home on land zoned for housing, if they hold no rights in another home.

What to do with this: before anything is signed, your lawyer checks whether the home is private land or Israel Land Authority land. The Land Registry extract in the next section shows it.

1. 01

   Hire your own lawyer first

   In Israel each side has its own lawyer, and the buyer's lawyer does the checking. Sign nothing before yours has seen it: any written undertaking to buy land can bind you, including a short “memorandum of understanding” (zichron dvarim).

2. 02

   Check the title

   A Land Registry extract (nesach tabu) shows the registered owners, mortgages, liens, court orders and restrictions as of the day it is issued. Anyone can order one online with the block and parcel numbers; it arrives by email within minutes and costs ₪18.

3. 03

   Sign the contract

   The contract sets the price, the payment schedule and the handover date. The day it is signed is the “purchase date” that every tax deadline below counts from, even though ownership passes later.

4. 04

   Register a warning note

   Once the seller has undertaken in writing to sell, a warning note (he'arat azhara) is recorded in the Land Registry at either side's request. While it stands, no contradicting deal can be registered without your consent or a court order. Registering it costs ₪188.

5. 05

   Report within 30 days, pay the tax within 60

   The buyer files a declaration of the purchase with the Tax Authority within 30 days of signing, and pays purchase tax within 60 days on their own calculation. Late filing is fined (₪310 for every two weeks in 2026) and unpaid tax carries linkage and interest from day 61.

6. 06

   Pay, get the keys, register

   You pay in the stages the contract sets and receive the keys at handover. Your lawyer then registers the transfer in the Land Registry — which needs the Tax Authority's confirmation that the purchase tax was paid in full. A purchase is only complete in law once it is registered.

• An estate agent is owed a fee only if you signed a written brokerage order that states the fee and whether it includes VAT — and only if the agent was the effective cause of the deal.
• The fee is not set by law. It is agreed before you sign the order, and it is negotiable. The custom in Israel is that buyer and seller each pay their own agent around 2% of the price plus VAT (18%).
• An agent acting for both sides must tell both, and may then be paid by both.
• Lawyers' fees are not regulated either; they are agreed up front, usually as a percentage of the price plus VAT. Ask for the figure in writing.

Most buyers abroad sign through a power of attorney given to their Israeli lawyer. The lawyer then signs the contract, the tax declarations and the registration papers in your name.

• An Israeli embassy or consulate verifies your signature on a document meant for use in Israel — for Israeli and foreign citizens alike. You appear in person and sign in front of the consul, not before.
• For a real-estate transaction the mission accepts only a valid passport or identity card as identification; a driving licence is not enough.
• You must understand the language of the document. If it is not in Hebrew or English it has to be translated first.
• Israel is a member of the Hague Apostille Convention, so a document notarised in another member country and stamped with an apostille is recognised in Israel. Ask your lawyer which route the bank and the Land Registry will accept in your case before you book an appointment.

A flat bought “on paper” is paid for while it is being built, so the law protects the money and limits what the developer may add to the price.

• Your money is secured. A developer may not take more than 7% of the price unless what you pay is secured — by a bank guarantee, an insurance policy or one of the other securities the law lists.
• Index linkage is capped. In contracts signed since 7 July 2022, at most half of each payment may be linked to the construction-cost index, and the first 20% of the price is never linked. Linkage stops at the handover date written in the contract.
• Late handover is compensated. After a one-month grace period you are owed, without proving damage, the rent of a similar flat for each month of delay up to the end of month four, 1.25 times that rent for months five to ten, and 1.5 times from month eleven. No compensation is due where the delay was caused only by the buyer or by circumstances the law treats as frustration of the contract.
• The developer's legal fee is capped. For registering your rights the developer may charge you at most the lower of ₪5,915 or 0.5% of the price, plus VAT (2026 figure).
• Purchase tax on a new flat is calculated on the price including VAT.