Mary Ann Tighe

Early life and education

One of three children born to Italian-Americans Edith and Frank P. Scarangello, Tighe grew up in the South Bronx. Tighe says “My mom was the secretary at the church rectory. My father managed a warehouse for Timken Roller Bearing Company.”

She attended Cardinal Spellman High School, then went to Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. as a Timken Scholar, taking a B.A. in English and graduating Phi Beta Kappa, magna cum laude, and then received her Master’s in Art History from the University of Maryland.

Career

Tighe became a fellow at the Smithsonian while finishing her master's degree, and moved on to join the White House Domestic Policy staff, serving as Arts Advisor to Vice President Walter Mondale. She subsequently was hired to be Deputy Chair of the National Endowment for the Arts. While in these arts-related roles, Tighe co-authored an art history textbook, Art America, published by McGraw-Hill, and wrote numerous articles for The New York Times and Vogue, as well as teaching art history at Georgetown University.

She returned to live in New York City in 1981, where she parlayed her experience in fine arts into a career in the cable TV industry, becoming a Vice President at American Broadcasting Company Video Enterprises. While there, Tighe launched the A&E Channel.

Tighe’s career in commercial real estate began when she was 36, while she was in Venice during a purchase for A&E. After she was hired by the Edward S. Gordon Company (albeit with no prior experience), Tighe did no transactions for 18 months. Then, Tighe was mentored by real-estate broker Carol Nelson, which is when Tighe started to conduct real-estate transactions. Tighe was promoted to the position of Vice Chairman of Insignia/ESG and then, in 2002, became CEO of CBRE’s New York Tri-State Region, which takes in 2,500 employees as of year-end 2016.

Tighe helped drive some of the most influential projects in New York City’s recent history, including the revitalization of Times Square when she brought Condé Nast there in 1996. Similarly, Condé Nast’s subsequent relocation to One World Trade Center in 2014, a deal brokered by Tighe and her team, was described as a harbinger of the cultural revilalization of Lower Manhattan while deals such as Ogilvy & Mather’s 2008 worldwide headquarters relocation to 565,000 square feet at 636 Eleventh Avenue (a former candy factory) and Coach’s 2013 purchase of a condo interest in 10 Hudson Yards represent a shift west of Midtown Manhattan’s CBD (central business district).

Tighe served as Chairman of the Real Estate Board of New York for a three-year term starting in January 2010. She was the first woman to hold the position in REBNY’s 114-year history and the first broker in 30 years. In a 2013 interview, Tighe said that when she first came to REBNY’s annual banquet in the early ’90s, she was “invisible” and “trampled”, and now, she felt like everyone knew her and she knew everyone. During her tenure as Chair, she advocated for the rezoning of Midtown East, as well as created a position for a technology officer to establish a broader web and social media presence for REBNY.

Recent work

Among Tighe’s most recent large-scale transactions, in 2017 she represented 21st Century Fox in its 784,000-square-foot headquarters extension and expansion at 1211 Avenue of the Americas and News Corp in a new 440,000-square-foot headquarters lease at 1211 Avenue of the Americas. In 2016 she represented Coach in its 693,938-square-foot leaseback at 10 Hudson Yards; ownership of 55 Water Street in the biggest leasing deal since 2014, McGraw Hill Financial’s 900,027-square-foot renewal; and L&L Holding Company in the 200,000-square-foot anchor lease to Citadel at the Foster + Partners-designed 425 Park Avenue, with a penthouse-level asking rent of $300 per square foot, the city’s most expensive office rent ever.

Tighe has headed the list of CBRE’s top firm-wide producers multiple years: 2008, 2011, 2014 and, most recently, 2016.

Personal life

Tighe married at age 20, but divorced soon after the birth of her son in 1971. She met David Hidalgo, who later became a renowned plastic surgeon, when he was 19 and she was his art history professor at Georgetown University. They were married in 1979. He was chairman of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center’s Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery from 1992-2000.

Affiliations and mentoring

Listed as number 163 (and one of only 25 women) on Crain’s list of Most Connected New Yorkers in 2014, Tighe was described as a “seasoned professional who works in a business with tentacles in many other industries, and who actively participates in numerous civic and charitable causes.” She is Chairman Emeritus of REBNY; a board member of The Howard Hughes Corporation, The Inner-City Scholarship Fund and Partnership for New York City; a trustee of St. Patrick’s Cathedral; a member of the Chairman’s Council of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Co-Chair of The Met’s Business Committee; and Vice Chair of Columbia University RED (Real Estate Development) Advisory Board. In 2014, she ranked #1 on the list of digital media company Bisnow Media’s New York Power Women.

Having credited Carol Nelson for mentoring her as a young broker, Tighe stated that mentorship is key to business growth. Tighe, in turn, mentors young women in the industry, stating in 2009 that she is mentoring "a group of young women in their mid-20s to mid-30s whom I call hardcore real estate women. I’m very engaged with this group because they’re the generation that’s going to make it commonplace for women to be at the negotiating tables and for women to be at the top tier of the industry.”

Philanthropy

Tighe's sister, journalist Joan Scarangello McNeive, died of lung cancer in 2001 at the age of 47, despite never having smoked. With her family and friends, Tighe founded Joan’s Legacy to honor her sister. Tighe’s mother, also a non-smoker, died from the disease. In 2009 Joan’s Legacy became Uniting Against Lung Cancer, reflecting the foundation’s commitment to uniting all families and organizations dedicated to conquering lung cancer. Since 2003, the organization has awarded more than $12 million to academic investigators, leading to more than $55 million in follow-on funding, new researchers entering the field, and scientific progress. In a merger approved in May 2015, Uniting Against Lung Cancer elected to merge with the Lung Cancer Research Foundation, another organization dedicated to funding research.

A scholarship student herself, Tighe co-founded the Scarangello Scholarship program in 1982 at Cardinal Spellman High School. The program honors the memory of Tighe’s parents by providing a college-preparatory Catholic high school education to six selected students at the school each year. She also funds scholarships to Saints Peter and Paul, her grade school, through the Inner-City Scholarship Fund.

Honors

Tighe received the Real Estate Board of New York’s Deal of the Year Award for ingenious brokerage eight times, a record number of wins since the award was created in 1944. She received the Louis Smadbeck Memorial Broker Recognition Award, REBNY’s highest award in brokerage, and REBNY’s Bernard H. Mendik Lifetime Achievement Award. Tighe was the first woman to receive the NYU Schack Institute of Real Estate’s Urban Leadership Award. In 2014, the American Institute of Architects honored her at its Heritage Ball. In her gratitude speech, Tighe named the many architects and engineers who taught her about city engagement, including renowned figures such as Henry N. Cobb, Norman Foster, Margo Grant, Bjarke Ingels, and Renzo Piano.