Urban housing markets are critical sites of inclusion and exclusion for forced migrants; however, the “gatekeeper” role of formal intermediaries has not been sufficiently examined in literature. This study investigates how real estate agents, acting as “urban managers”, shape the housing pathways and spatial segregation of Syrian refugees in Bursa, one of Türkiye’s major industrial metropolises. Drawing on semi-structured interviews with 27 real estate agents operating in three socioeconomically diverse central districts, the research identifies a three-layered exclusion mechanism. First, real estate agents rationalize the discriminatory demands of property owners through the myth of the “ideal tenant” and the discourse of physical risk management, thus reflecting customer prejudice in practice. Second, this exclusion from the formal market pushes refugees into an informal “shadow economy” driven by ethnic networks and unregistered brokers. The resulting overcrowded living conditions are then used by formal actors to further legitimize exclusion, creating a persistent vicious cycle. Finally, the state’s administrative quotas, intended to prevent ethnic agglomeration, intersect with market discrimination. Trapped between administrative restrictions and market barriers, refugees are forced into deeper segregation within urban space. This study contends that, in the absence of inclusive housing governance, urban integration policies are structurally undermined by these invisible boundaries inherent in local housing markets.
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