When anyone in the municipal bond industry thinks of housing, Marian Zucker is often the first person who comes to mind.
She is known as a consummate municipal finance professional when it comes to homes and affordable housing and is one of the top experts in the field.
But it didn't start out that way.
"When I was in grad school, I took a class and part of it focused on municipal finance. I can still remember the professor showing us a municipal bond, a bearer bond," she told The Bond Buyer. "And as I'm listening to him drone on and on, I was thinking, 'This is the most boring thing that I have ever heard of in my entire life!'"
But that attitude changed quickly.
"I am so fortunate to have found my passion — affordable housing finance — in graduate school and spent the next 40-plus years in this field. It has been a fulfilling, intellectually interesting and constantly evolving journey," she wrote in her farewell missive to friends and colleagues on LinkedIn. She retired on Dec. 1.
"I've enjoyed each of the positions I've held — in the public and private sectors — and appreciated how the work kept me learning and challenging myself along the way," she wrote.
Her expertise, experience and education are wide and varied.
She graduated from Buffalo State University with a bachelor's degree in education and later attended Harvard University's Graduate School of Design, where she earned a master's degree in city and regional planning, with a focused field of study in housing.
She began her career at the New York State Department of Housing, Preservation and Development, working in a variety of positions.
She then moved into the private sector to work at Bear Stearns, where she was a vice president and an investment banker responsible for tax-exempt bond offerings for housing finance agencies and developers.
After that, she worked as a senior vice president at Security Pacific Merchant Bank, a senior vice president at Dean Witter Reynolds and a senior vice president at PaineWebber before returning to the public sector to become Suffolk County, New York's first director of affordable housing.
She then joined New York State's
In 2017, she became the lead of
Her friends and colleagues were happy to have worked with her, but sad that she is retiring.
"Marian's passion for the housing sector is inspirational and the depth of her knowledge and experience in the sector was so valuable to our public finance team," said Robin Prunty, managing director and chief analytical officer at S&P.
"It's been an absolute pleasure working with Marian during her time at S&P," Prunty said. "She made everyone want to learn more about affordable housing and how fundamental it is to understanding economic and social factors broadly."
Eden Perry echoed those sentiments.
"Marian's depth of knowledge and passion for housing is unsurpassed. She will be missed by her colleagues and friends at S&P," said Perry, S&P's head of U.S. public finance. "We wish her the best of luck on her next chapter!"
The people at S&P took a chance on me, Zucker said.
"I had no typical credit analytic background, but Robin had a chat with me — we were both on the Municipal Forum of New York's Board of Directors at the time — and it proved to be an unexpectedly good fit," she said.
"As much as I was able to contribute there — and I do think I made some significant contributions during my time at S&P — I also learned plenty and walked away with a great deal of respect for Robin and Eden and the other sector leads and the work they do to stay on top of the industry and approach it in a critical and analytic way," she said.
Kent Hiteshew, strategic advisor at EY LLC (Ernst & Young), said Zucker is the epitome of the public finance professional who has excelled in both the public and private sectors.
"Her experience in the public sector made her a better banker and her banking skills made her both one of the top issuers and credit rating officials in the country," Hiteshew said. "I'm proud to have worked with and learned from her in both capacities."
Howard Zucker, managing partner at Hawkins Delafield & Wood LLP, said he was impressed with the depth and breadth of her experience.
"I have had the privilege of working with Marian (no relation) for approximately 40 years from when she first joined a housing group of a major bond underwriter," he said.
"Over the years, Marian was at major bracket investment banks, a housing finance agency, a very significant umbrella issuer of single-family, multi-family and tobacco securitization bonds," he said. "In addition, for the past several years, Marian was the head of the S&P municipal housing group. Her career reminds me of Judy Collins' iconic song, 'Both Sides Now,' inasmuch she has seen our industry from all sides."
William Thompson, partner and chief administrative officer at Siebert Williams Shank, praised Zucker's knowledge and experience.
"Marian is a very smart, talented professional who knows housing finance better than anyone I've known," said Thompson, former comptroller of the city of New York.
"I had the great honor of working with her for several years while chairing the New York State Housing Finance Agency," he said. "She is a great public servant and New York was quite fortunate to have her skills and talent."
Looking ahead to the future, Zucker said that while she has no specific plans she is really looking forward to retirement.
"I'm on the board of Habitat for Humanity of New York City and Westchester," she said. "I'm on the board of the local Housing Authority here in East Hampton and I was just appointed to the Citizens Advisory Committee in the Town of East Hampton."
She added that she volunteers at several cultural institutions.
"I intend to travel, but I don't have a specific timetable," she said. "I'm approaching retirement the way I have many other things in my life — I don't need to know everything about what it is, I just have to be willing to take that first step into my future."
She said it was really exciting to have a life without work as its center.
"I am so happy," she said. "It's exciting. It's a new chapter in the book of life that I will get to write — and to live. I feel that I have just been very, very lucky."
Howard Zucker noted that Marian excelled in any and all activities that she undertook.
"Her defining quality to me was that she was always very serious and substantive, very honest and made her decisions based on the merits of the issue as she evaluated it in good faith. Her retirement is a loss for the municipal housing industry and she will be missed," Howard Zucker said.
Marian's work has been recognized often during her career. She received the Municipal Forum of New York's
"Reflecting on my initial impression of municipal bonds in school, it contrasts with what my experience has been in the muni market, which is that it's such a force for good, filled with so many people dedicated to making our world a better place. It's been great," Zucker said.
