Decades of retail investment mastery, a career that spans every cycle since 1991, and a brand-new chapter in Pasadena. David Maling joins NAI Capital Commercial as executive vice president, and the San Gabriel Valley just gained a heavyweight.
NAI Capital Commercial has hired David Maling as executive vice president in the company’s Pasadena office, per the company’s announcement in early June. Maling brings more than three decades in commercial real estate to the role, spanning investment and owner-user sales, leasing, and bank foreclosure and special asset dispositions, with deep expertise in single tenant net lease deals and 1031 exchanges. Most recently he spent nearly eight years as executive vice president at Colliers International, where he ranked among the firm’s top producers in Greater Los Angeles, closing 78 deals in 2012 alone and selling properties across 31 states. The USC alum has spent his entire career serving Southern California’s private investors, family offices, and institutions.
The resume underneath runs even deeper. Maling spent nearly 14 years at Marcus & Millichap’s Los Angeles office as director of the Special Assets Group, winning Rookie of the Year in his first year and ranking among the office’s top ten agents from 1998 through 2008. He works closely with lenders across the country on the disposition of special assets and foreclosures, and he began his career in asset management at Charles Dunn Company and Capital Growth Properties, ground-level training in how buildings actually perform that still shows in how he advises owners today. He also maintains an active leasing practice with a particular focus on helping small business owners open and grow their operations, which might be the most Recruiter Hustle detail in the whole story: a three-decade veteran still making room for the little guy.
For NAI Capital, the SoCal-rooted brokerage with offices across the region, this is a statement of ambition and belief in its own platform. Landing a producer of Maling’s stature affirms what veteran brokers across the market increasingly recognize: regional firms offer autonomy, local decision-making, and entrepreneurial economics that let senior talent do their best work. When a broker of Maling’s stature chooses your platform for his next chapter, that is the strongest endorsement a firm can receive.
The Pasadena angle makes it even better. The San Gabriel Valley’s retail and mixed-use investment market runs on long-cycle trust, families and investors who work with the same advisor across decades of trades. Maling’s 1031 exchange mastery serves exactly those clients, quarterbacking the tax-driven strategies that keep private capital moving and compounding. Planting that expertise in the heart of Pasadena deepens NAI Capital’s bench precisely where the region’s private wealth is most active, a dynamic we chronicle in Quiet Money.
And the career lesson gleams for every professional in the business. A deep specialty plus durable relationships equals permanent relevance. Decades in, Maling is not coasting, he is expanding, bringing a career’s worth of client trust to a new platform on his own terms. The brand on the door matters, but the name on the relationship matters more, and the professionals who invest in genuine, decades-long client care write their own tickets in any market, at any age. It is the exact ethos we celebrate across the SoCal talent market: expertise ages like wine when it is built on trust.
For NAI Capital’s Pasadena office, an anchor arrives. For the San Gabriel Valley’s investors, more seasoned counsel at the table. And for the LA brokerage community, more proof that Southern California remains a market where great careers keep finding new gears.
NAI Capital’s regional roots complete the picture beautifully. The firm has spent decades building one of the largest independently minded brokerage networks in Southern California, with deep local knowledge in every submarket it serves. Adding a specialist of Maling’s caliber to the Pasadena office strengthens a platform that has always bet on relationships over sheer scale, and it signals to every senior producer in the region that the firm is investing in excellence. Great talent attracts great talent, and this hire will echo.
To David Maling: congratulations. A career built on trust, craft, and the best relationships in the valley, now with a new home in Pasadena. Here’s to the next chapter.
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Sources & verification
Appointment: NAI Capital Commercial announcement, June 3, 2026, via RENTV · career history verified against David Maling’s LinkedIn profile · also carried in Commercial Property Executive, week of July 6
Cathy Trinh is the founder of Recruiter Hustle and has worked in executive search since 1998, advising companies and leaders across finance, accounting, operations, manufacturing, logistics, real estate, technology and professional services. Through Recruiter Hustle, she combines executive search, talent intelligence and market media to help companies and people make better decisions about work and leadership. HEART. HUMAN. HUSTLE.