Senior Backend Engineer

About VacationRenter VacationRenter is the fastest growing vacation rental search engine. We love traveling, but not how time-consuming and complex it can be to find the right place to stay. So we reimagined a better way. We eliminated the need to search across several sites and scroll through pages of irrelevant results just to find the perfect home away from home. We aggregate accommodations from the top travel sites, giving travelers all the best options in one place. VacationRenter was born inside the startup studio Wilbur Labs. VacationRenter uses automation and AI to help travelers find the perfect stay. Be sure to check out our rebranded site, Vogo.com. Vogo is the same company travelers have come to love but under a new name. About This Role VacationRenter is seeking a versatile, highly skilled Senior Backend Engineer to join our engineering organization. In this role, you’ll help ensure high performance, reliability, and scalability, and contribute to the architecture and direction of our systems. Our backend systems are the backbone of the traveler experience, and this role plays a critical part in scaling our platform to support millions of users and high-volume transactions. The ideal candidate will own key backend initiatives and help shape engineering culture, collaborating closely with product, engineering, and leadership to build the services and APIs that power our platform. This role will report directly to the Head of Engineering. This is a full-time hybrid position, based in Dallas. Role & Responsibilities:

Design, architect, and implement robust APIs and services using Node.js, PostgreSQL, and Redis

Optimize complex SQL queries and schemas to ensure lightning-fast performance across large datasets

Tackle high-scale engineering challenges to ensure reliability and efficiency under heavy traffic

Collaborate cross-functionally with product, engineering, and leadership teams on backend features

Proactively identify and resolve technical debt; lead refactoring projects to future-proof our stack

Participate in team standups, code reviews, and deployment processes

Mentor and support other engineers, helping to elevate team-wide technical excellence

Take ownership of projects and drive initiatives from concept to production

Minimum Qualifications:

8+ years of backend software engineering experience

Strong experience with Node.js and PostgreSQL (or equivalent relational databases)

Strong SQL skills - able to write, debug, and optimize complex queries on large datasets

Experience working on high-volume, consumer-facing platforms

Solid understanding of backend architecture, distributed systems, and scalability principles

Experience with DevOps practices and cloud infrastructure (preferably Google Cloud or AWS), including CI/CD, monitoring, and infrastructure as code

Entrepreneurial mindset with a self-driven, ownership mentality

Excellent collaboration and communication skills

Preferred Qualifications & Prior Experience:

Experience in the travel, marketplace, or e-commerce space

Experience scaling systems to millions of daily users

Experience building and deploying machine learning models using Vertex AI or similar platforms (e.g., SageMaker, Azure ML)

Experience with React and Next.js

Contributions to open-source projects or tech communities

Benefits & Perks:

Competitive salary + equity

Top-tier laptop provided100% company-paid health benefits for base plan coverage, with the option to upgrade to higher-tier plans

401(k) with company match

Unlimited, guilt-free vacation days

Annual wellness stipend (gym + other wellness activities)

Monthly house cleaning stipend

Annual travel allowance

Monthly cell phone & internet usage stipend

Charity donation company match

Employee referral bonus

Team offsites/activities