A foreigner can buy a flat in Georgia but not a field. The lease is the route that works

For flats, houses, offices and shops, a foreign buyer is on the same footing as a Georgian one: there are no nationality-based limits on owning residential or commercial real estate, which is why the market in Tbilisi and Batumi is as open to outside money as it is. Agricultural land is a separate legal category and the opposite rule applies. Ownership of farmland is constitutionally reserved to Georgian nationals and Georgian entities, and the Law on Agricultural Land Ownership prohibits acquisition by foreign individuals and by foreign-owned legal entities. The distinction is not about size or location but about the registered designation of the plot, which is why the first question on any land purchase is what the register says it is.

The first is inheritance. A foreign individual who inherits agricultural land may keep it — but the right is personal to that person, and it does not pass on to a company unless further conditions are satisfied. So inherited farmland is a thing you may hold, not a structure you can build a business around. The second is a Georgian-registered legal entity in foreign hands, which may own farmland only where the Government of Georgia has approved the specific acquisition on the basis of a viable investment plan connected to agriculture, rural development or a related sector. That approval is a decision, not a formality, and the restriction remains in force without it — including where the dominant partner is foreign or cannot be identified. Setting up a Georgian company does not, on its own, get around the rule.

If what you want is to farm, make wine or run a guesthouse on rural land, the lease is the mechanism the law actually provides for. The Civil Code covers agricultural leases specifically, with or without farm buildings, and general lease rules fill the gaps. Three features are worth knowing before you sign. The contract must be in writing — if it is not, it is presumed to run for an indefinite term, which is rarely what either side intends. An indefinite lease can be ended only at the end of a lease year, with notice given no later than a month after that year ends, and the same timing applies to early termination. And the lessor is required to compensate capital expenditure that improves the property as the contract provides, which makes the improvements clause the part of the document to negotiate hardest if you plan to plant, build or irrigate.

Land is not the only reserved area. Air traffic control, railway systems, defence production, nuclear energy and the minting of currency are reserved to the state, and closed to foreign and private entities alike. A separate list of activities is prohibited regardless of nationality, covering nuclear, chemical and biological weapons production, human cloning research, and the cultivation or unregulated distribution of narcotics. None of this touches the ordinary buyer of an apartment, but it is worth knowing if you are structuring a business rather than buying a home. One caution on all of the above: the summary here is drawn from published commentary, including a note dated September 2025 and a lease page updated this month, and land designation and government approvals are decided case by case. Take advice on the specific plot and the specific structure before committing money.