Sr Staff Software Engineer

Realtor.com is seeking a Senior Staff Software Engineer to provide technical leadership for the Consumer Services backend platform as it consolidates into the Services & API Gateways platform. This hands-on role will lead architecture and execution across the federated graph and API platform, subgraph transition work, revenue-critical lead-submission services, and shared backend libraries.

The ideal candidate is a hands-on backend architect who can balance design and implementation with cross-team technical leadership, improve operational resilience, and help domain teams safely adopt the shared graph, gateway, governance, and paved-road platform.

What you will do:

• Own the technical direction for the relevant subgraphs during the transition, including the platform responsibilities that remain in the consolidated gateway/federation stack.
• Lead Hestia and Pantheon consolidation, federated-graph architecture, API/BFF standards, service boundaries, schema evolution, caching, circuit breakers, SLOs, and observability.
• Design and deliver reliable, scalable Node.js and TypeScript services using GraphQL, Apollo Federation, AWS, Kubernetes/EKS, and infrastructure-as-code practices.
• Protect the revenue-critical lead-submission path while executing the planned transition of inquiry business logic to Connections and the decomposition of subgraph business logic to the appropriate domain teams.
• Establish federation governance and reference implementations for domain teams, including self-service onboarding, composition checks, breaking-change checks, schema standards, health scorecards, and operational readiness across 32+ subgraphs.
• Partner with Microservices and platform teams, Connections, Buyer, Seller, Client, domain teams, Pantheon, GLA, Quality Enablement, and other stakeholders to resolve dependencies and deliver the consolidation safely.
• Drive knowledge resilience through documentation, architecture reviews, cross-training, runbooks, and development of primary and secondary owners for critical services.
• Improve backend quality through API-layer integration testing, contract testing, performance budgets, CI/CD quality gates, and pragmatic reduction of fragile end-to-end coverage.
• Lead production readiness reviews, incident response, post-incident improvements, and operational standards for the shared consumer API and graph platform.
• Mentor engineers and contractors through technical direction, design reviews, pairing, and clear engineering guidance.

What you bring:

• Extensive experience designing and operating production backend systems and API platforms at scale.
• Deep proficiency in Node.js and TypeScript, with strong experience building APIs and services with GraphQL and Apollo Federation.
• Experience with distributed systems, event-driven or asynchronous workflows, caching, resiliency patterns, observability, and incident management.
• Strong AWS and Kubernetes/EKS experience, including deployment, monitoring, and production operations.
• Demonstrated ability to lead architecture across multiple teams without relying solely on formal authority.
• Experience defining service boundaries, schemas, APIs, technical standards, and migration strategies in complex platforms.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to explain complex technical tradeoffs to engineering and product stakeholders.
• A track record of mentoring engineers and creating systems that reduce single points of failure.
• Experience with GraphQL federation, schema governance, composition pipelines, and federated platform architecture.
• Experience with API gateways, routing, WAF integration, and high-volume consumer traffic.
• Familiarity with Redis, DynamoDB, S3, ArgoCD, CI/CD automation, and AWS security practices.
• Experience modernizing monoliths or shared platforms into domain-aligned services.
• Experience building self-service developer platforms, paved roads, or quality-enablement practices.

Success in the first 12 months:

• The relevant subgraphs have clear transition plans, documented architecture, operational runbooks, and trained secondary responders.
• Hestia and Pantheon consolidation progresses against the FY27 roadmap, with clear graph, gateway, and subgraph boundaries.
• Transitions of subgraph business capabilities to domain teams are executed safely, with knowledge transfer and receiving-team readiness.
• Federation governance, schema checks, reference implementations, and self-service onboarding are usable by domain teams across the shared graph.
• Lead-submission reliability, incident response, observability, and CI/CD quality practices measurably improve.
• The platform no longer depends on a single deep owner for critical Consumer Services capabilities.

How We Work:

We balance creativity and innovation on a foundation of in-person collaboration. For most roles, our employees work three or more days in our offices, where they have the opportunity to collaborate in-person, adding richness to our culture and knitting us closer together.

How We Reward You:

Realtor.com is committed to investing in the health and wellbeing of our employees and their families. Our benefits programs include, but are not limited to:

• Inclusive and Competitive medical, Rx, dental, and vision coverage
• Family forming benefits
• 13 Paid Holidays
• Flexible Time Off
• 8 hours of paid Volunteer Time off
• Immediate eligibility into Company 401(k) plan with 3.5% company match
• Tuition Reimbursement program for degreed and non-degreed programs
• 1:1 personalized Financial Planning Sessions
• Student Debt Retirement Savings Match program
• Free snacks and refreshments in each office location