Founding Full-Stack Product Engineering Intern — AI Marketplace
Settlyfe Inc.
ABOUT SETTLYFE
Settlyfe is building an AI-powered, end-to-end housing marketplace connecting renters, landlords, agents, and trusted service providers across the full housing journey—from search and leasing to moving, furniture, maintenance, and home services. We are preparing for launch and looking for product-minded engineers who want meaningful ownership rather than isolated ticket work.
THE OPPORTUNITY
You will work directly with the founding, product, design, QA, and engineering teams to build and launch real user-facing marketplace features. You will contribute across the stack, from responsive interfaces and APIs to data models, integrations, tests, and deployment.
“Founding” reflects the level of ownership: you will help shape engineering patterns, product decisions, documentation, and launch systems future teams will use.
WHAT YOU’LL DO
– Build and improve renter, landlord, agent, provider, marketplace, account, messaging, matching, and service-booking experiences.
– Develop responsive, accessible interfaces using modern React, Next.js, TypeScript, and component-based design patterns.
– Build and integrate backend services, APIs, authentication, permissions, notifications, search, and marketplace workflows using Node.js and related tools.
– Design and query reliable data models using PostgreSQL or Supabase; work with geospatial or NoSQL systems when useful.
– Ship AI-assisted product experiences such as intelligent search, recommendations, content support, or workflow automation with appropriate safeguards and evaluation.
– Collaborate with design and product partners to turn ambiguous launch needs into scoped, testable features.
– Write maintainable code, tests, migrations, technical notes, and clear pull requests.
– Review code, reproduce bugs, fix launch blockers, and improve performance, security, accessibility, and reliability.
– Work with GitHub, CI/CD, preview environments, monitoring, and production feedback loops.
– Participate in planning, demos, retrospectives, release reviews, and weekly engineering readouts.
HOW SUCCESS IS MEASURED
We value reliable product outcomes, not lines of code. Core KPIs include:
– Production-ready features and user journeys shipped.
– Launch blockers and high-impact defects resolved.
– Pull-request quality, test coverage, maintainability, and review responsiveness.
– Cycle time from clear requirement to verified release.
– Reduction in regression risk, technical friction, and recurring defects.
– Quality of engineering documentation, ownership, and cross-functional collaboration.
WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR
– Student or early-career engineer studying or practicing computer science, software engineering, information systems, data science, or a related field.
– Experience building at least one working web or mobile product through coursework, internships, hackathons, open source, or personal projects.
– Familiarity with JavaScript or TypeScript and a modern frontend framework such as React or Next.js.
– Basic understanding of APIs, databases, Git, debugging, and software testing.
– Product judgment: you care about the user experience, not only whether code compiles.
– Able to break down ambiguous problems, ask good questions, and communicate tradeoffs clearly.
– Experience with Node.js, PostgreSQL, Supabase, React Native, Python, cloud deployment, LLM APIs, or automated testing is a plus, not a requirement.
– Able to work independently while collaborating closely with a fast-moving team.
WHAT YOU’LL GAIN
– Direct experience shipping an AI-powered, two-sided marketplace.
– Portfolio-ready production features, engineering decisions, and launch results.
– Close collaboration with founders, designers, product leaders, QA, and marketplace operators.
– Ownership of real product areas and engineering systems that can continue beyond the internship.
– Consideration for expanded responsibility, paid continuation, or longer-term opportunities based on company needs, performance, and applicable law. No future opportunity is guaranteed.
TIME AND COMPENSATION
Full time is 30-40 hours per week. Part time is a minimum of 20 hours per week. Scheduling is flexible and based on deliverables. The position is initially unpaid. Remote candidates are welcome; candidates in San Diego may also join optional in-person product and launch collaboration.
HOW TO APPLY
Please submit your resume and a short note explaining why you want to build Settlyfe. Include a link to GitHub, a portfolio, demo, or code sample and briefly explain one technical decision you made. Strong personal, coursework, hackathon, or open-source projects are welcome; prior startup employment is not required.