Bio

Mari Canton has nearly 30 years and over $4 billion of global real estate capital raising and investing experience. Ms. Canton has worked extensively on real estate transactions in Latin America, the United States, Europe and Asia. Her extensive experience in developed as well as emerging markets enables Ms. Canton to bring a unique perspective to real estate transactions worldwide. Since 2006, Ms. Canton has advised major private equity players such as Grove International (a Soros firm), JP Morgan, Starwood Capital and JERobert Companies on their strategic initiatives and acquisition efforts in Latin America. She also served as the US fundraiser for Savills (UK) and DTZ (UK), among the world’s largest publicly traded real estate companies, and presently works with UBS’s wealth management group to provide real estate investment opportunities and asset management services to its client base. Ms. Canton also provided real estate consulting services to INTL Provident Group, which subsequently asked her to lead their real estate effort globally. The Group closed on several transactions including a $95 million capital raise for a shopping center development in Rio, a $40 million platform for a Brazilian homebuilder and selling a majority interest in a South American construction company. Previously Ms. Canton was a Director in UBS’s global real estate private equity fundraising group, covering over 200 institutional accounts for fund, property and corporate-level investments. Ms. Canton worked on several fundraises, including a $350 million US real estate opportunity fund, a $600 million Indian property fund and a $100 million US secondary financing.Earlier in her career, Ms. Canton headed up the real estate group for Bankers Trust’s (now Deutsche Bank) Latin America Merchant Bank, where she developed the bank’s real estate strategy and managed both advisory and merchant banking assignments. Prior to Bankers Trust, Ms. Canton was a Vice President in Salomon Brothers’ (now Citigroup) real estate finance group. During her tenure, Ms. Canton also worked on RTC transactions, management-led buyouts and distressed opportunities for the firm’s principal account, and was responsible for the management of several of the assets acquired. Ms. Canton started her career at Salomon as a real estate research analyst. Ms. Canton is a frequent speaker/moderator at estate industry association events such as the Global Real Estate Institute, the Private Equity Real Estate Summit, ADIT Invest (Brazil’s premier developers’ association), the IMN real estate finance conferences, and the Graaskamp Center for Real Estate Forum. Ms. Canton earned a Masters degree in Business Administration from Harvard Business School and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology from Duke University.