Alabama-headquartered Regions Bank, has hired three experienced bankers to expand its real estate capabilities in Texas.

Wendel Pardue, Richard Gross, and Buddy Billingsley join from Wells Fargo and will focus on providing financing and advisory services to private regional and national developers, with an emphasis on office, retail, industrial and multi-family projects.

Pardue has been named commercial real estate market manager for Texas and will be responsible for managing a team of commercial real estate relationship managers and service specialists across the state.

Pardue and Gross will be based in Dallas, with a primary focus on clients and projects in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

Based in Austin, Billingsley will be responsible for business development in Austin, San Antonio, and surrounding markets.

Pardue has worked in commercial real estate banking in Texas since the mid-1980s. He has held a number roles at Wells Fargo and legacy Wachovia Bank, most recently serving as commercial real estate market manger for Central Texas, responsible for the Wells Fargo commercial real estate platform for Austin, San Antonio, El Paso and Oklahoma.

Gross has more than 16 years of commercial real estate banking experience as a relationship and credit manager in the Dallas area. He held a number of real estate banking roles with Wells Fargo and legacy Wachovia Bank and was most recently director and commercial real estate senior relationship manager in Dallas.

Billingsley has more than 15 years of financial services industry experience and has been involved in commercial real estate in the Austin and Houston markets since 2004, most recently as a commercial real estate relationship manager for Wells Fargo in Austin.

In other news, in May, Regions Bank named Anne Copeland as head of its private wealth management business. 

Regions launched its wealth management group in June 2011 in a move involving the integration of its existing trust, private banking, asset management and insurance businesses.

Regions Private Wealth Management operates 50 offices and serves clients across 16 states.