BMO Capital Markets, the investment and corporate banking arm of BMO Financial Group, announced on Tuesday that it has hired Eric Wurtzebach as director and Faris Mansour as vice president in its real estate and construction group.

“The real estate sector continues to grow and evolve and the hiring of Eric and Faris reflects the strength and dynamism of the market,” said David Rubin, managing director and head, U.S. real estate and construction. “Our clients — both public and private real estate investors and developers throughout North America — look to us for integrated capital market solutions, and the experience and expertise brought by these two senior investment bankers will further strengthen the capabilities we’ve been building in this sector for well over three decades.”

BMO Capital Markets’ real estate and construction group now has 45 professionals across the U.S. and Canada.

“Eric and Faris represent our fourth and fifth senior hires over the past month,” said Dominic Petito, executive managing director and head, U.S. investment and corporate banking. “These hirings further our goal of adding depth and expertise in delivering the full suite of products and services that define a leading universal investment bank.”

Wurtzebach joins BMO Capital Markets from the real estate investment banking firm Silver Portal Capital, where he was a founding partner. He has deep investment banking and real estate expertise, raising capital and providing financial advisory to private and public companies, as well as investing on behalf of institutional clients such as pension funds, endowments and foundations. His experience includes acting as a managing underwriter, placement agent and advisor on over $5.5 billion of real estate equity, debt and financial advisory transactions. In addition, he has been involved in over $800 million in property acquisitions on behalf of domestic institutional investors.

Mansour also comes from Silver Portal Capital, where he too was a founding partner. He has broad-based experience and expertise in acquisition and advisory services, capital raising and debt structuring, with a specific focus on the real estate, lodging and leisure industries. He has completed over $8 billion in merger, acquisition and divestiture advisory assignments and more than $9 billion in public and private capital raising transactions. Prior to joining Silver Portal Capital, Mansour held positions in investment banking with Chase Securities and First Union Securities.