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The Role
Leads the Core renter experience across web and native mobile. Responsibilities include setting product direction, designing and prototyping functional experiences with AI tools, maintaining design systems, conducting research and experiments, collaborating with product and engineering, and mentoring designers. The role requires hands-on product design, strong visual and interaction craft, mobile-first thinking, and the ability to influence senior stakeholders while owning ambiguous, cross-functional problems.
Summary Generated by Built In
About Apartment List
The Job
Lead Core, end to end
Build AI-forward
Lead through influence
What makes you right for this
Must Haves
Nice to have
Here's the Pay Range:
Apartment List is rethinking renting from the ground up: agentic search, personalized matching, guidance a renter can trust. Core is where all of that reaches a renter. It's our largest product surface, spanning ApartmentList.com, mobile web, and native iOS and Android, and it's where the company's biggest bets have to hold up on a real device in a renter's hand. This role leads that surface.
This is a hands-on seat. You'll work with product and engineering to decide what Core takes on, then make it yourself: design it, prototype it in code, and hand engineering something they can build from. You'll make the case for where Core goes next, too. We hire on what you've shipped and the bar you hold everyone else to.
- Lead the renter experience across web, mobile web, and native iOS and Android. You're accountable for its coherence, quality, and direction.
- Balance maintenance and invention. Core carries real traffic and real revenue, so you improve what exists as much as you build what's next, and you know which one a given week calls for.
- Set the craft bar: visual, interaction, and systems. Create the patterns and standards other senior designers calibrate against.
- Prototype in Cursor and Claude Code until it's functionally real, not just clickable. Wire it to our actual components, variables, and tokens so engineering builds from your prototype instead of starting over. Engineering drives architecture, performance, and the merge.
- Make AI a default part of how you work. Form a point of view on what's working and fold new tools into your process the week they land.
- Bring a point of view on where Core should head, grounded in renters, data, and taste, and get senior product, engineering, and executive partners behind it.
- Find problems nobody handed you. Use qualitative and quantitative research and experiments to decide what's worth building, and change your mind when users tell you to.
- Mentor without managing. Raise the level of every designer you work with through critique, pairing, and example, and finish what you start.
- 10+ years designing digital products, owning ambiguous, cross-functional problems with minimal direction.
- You build with AI in real work. You've shipped working prototypes or production code with tools like Cursor or Claude Code, and you can say what the AI got right, where it fell short, and how you validated it.
- You've shipped on both web and native mobile, and you think mobile-first.
- Your work has scaled beyond you. A framework, pattern library, starter kit, or standard that other designers or teams adopted. We look at scope, not title.
- Craft you can show: Figma fluency (auto layout, components, variables, systems), plus visual design, typography, interaction, and motion that others copy.
- You act without being told: you spot problems, decide, follow through to resolution, and know when to say no.
- A two-sided marketplace at real scale.
- Partnering directly with C-suite leaders on product direction.
- A side project taken from idea to launch
At Apartment List, we carefully consider a variety of factors to determine compensation for each position, including the role, level, and work. The US base salary range for this position is:
- Zone 1: $222,000 - $269,000 TTC (including $195,600 - $237,000 base salary) + equity
- Zone 2: $205,000 - $249,000 TTC (including $181,000 - $219,000 base salary) + equity
- Zone 3: $189,000 - $229,000 TTC (including $166,000 - $201,000 base salary) + equity
This reflects the compensation target for new hire salaries for the position across all US locations. Please note, the compensation details provided do not include benefits and perks that we offer.
We also rely on market indicators along with considering your work location, job related skills, experience and relevant education and training, to determine compensation that is fair and competitive for you. Apartment List will consider paying compensation near the higher of the range in exceptional circumstances, where candidates have the experience, credentials or expertise that would warrant such consideration. It is always our goal to hire exceptional talent and we would be happy to share more about compensation during the hiring process.
Here's what's in it for you (full-time US based employees only; does not apply to contract roles):
- Competitive Compensation: Including annual salary, pre-IPO stock options, and other financial compensation (if applicable)
- Medical, Dental, and Vision Coverage: 100% of premiums covered for you AND all of your dependents
- Unlimited Flexible Time Off: Unlimited FTO in addition to 12 company holidays per year, quarterly “recharge” days, and a week-long holiday break
- Home Office Reimbursement: To cover home office furniture and supplies, monthly home internet, and monthly cell phone (if applicable)
- Health & Wellness Reimbursement: To cover monthly gym membership or other qualifying expenses
- Parental Support: Generous parental and family leave, fertility benefits, and employer-sponsored stipends towards family forming services
- 401k Plan: To support you in your individual retirement goals
- Homeownership & Mortgage Savings: Access exclusive mortgage rates up to 1% below retail lenders and free 1:1 expert guidance.
- Team Events: Frequent team-building events, fun team off-sites, and bi-annual company meetups
- Commitment to DEI: To prioritize Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion within our workplace and to stay true to our values and mission
- Mentorship and Training: To get you onboard quickly, learn new professional skills, and invest in your career development
- Impact and Visibility: To expose you to and provide the opportunity to work on highly strategic initiatives that will transform the business
- Encouragement and Empowerment: To explore and adopt new technologies and drive meaningful decisions and outcomes
- At Apartment List we believe that everyone deserves a home they love AND a career they love. We strive to build a diverse team that is a reflection of the people we serve; this is made possible through our commitment to fostering a culture of diversity, inclusion, equity, and connectedness.
As a proud equal opportunity employer, we celebrate the collection of individual differences, life experiences, ideas, perspectives, knowledge, and talent. We hire candidates of any race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, marital or family status, disability, Veteran status, and any other status. #LIRemote
Skills Required
- 10+ years designing digital products and owning ambiguous, cross-functional problems with minimal direction
- Hands-on experience building with AI tools such as Cursor or Claude Code
- Shipped products on both web and native mobile
- Experience creating frameworks, pattern libraries, starter kits, or standards adopted by other designers or teams
- Figma fluency, including auto layout, components, variables, and design systems
- Strong visual design, typography, interaction, and motion skills
- Ability to independently identify problems, make decisions, follow through, and set boundaries
- Experience with a two-sided marketplace at real scale
- Experience partnering directly with C-suite leaders on product direction
- A side project taken from idea to launch
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The Company
What We Do
For us, renting is personal — we’re a company built by renters for renters. We’re here to deliver renters a home they love at the value they deserve. Whether renters are embarking to a new city, in search of a quieter neighborhood, or making the jump to a two-bedroom apartment — we’re here to find them their perfect apartment match. We’ve made it our mission to revolutionize renting by making it a stress-free, simple, and holistic experience, connecting ready-to-move renters with compatible city living. Home is a feeling everyone should own, and we’re on a mission to help renters find it.
Why Work With Us
Want a job that makes a difference? There are over 100 million renters in the US, and at Apartment List, we strive every day to remove the hassle from renting and make the process better for every single one of them. Together, we can change the narrative around what it means to be a renter.
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