Full-Stack Engineer

At Koalafi, we believe in a world where no one has to put an important purchase on hold. That’s why we’re making it easier for more people to pay for big purchases over time.

Retailers across the country rely on us to offer flexible lease-to-own financing to their non-prime consumers, while increasing sales and strengthening customer loyalty. Their 2M+ customers love us because we provide a flexible way for them to make payments and give them an opportunity to improve their credit. Our 200+ Koalafi teammates enjoy inspiring and challenging work that accelerates their careers.

Interested in learning more about how we’re transforming the financing experience and joining our team?

About the Role

Koalafi is building a net-new Non-Prime Installment Loan product — a greenfield initiative that expands our financing options for customers who don't fit traditional prime credit profiles. This is a meaningful product with real impact: more customers funded, more merchants closing sales they'd otherwise lose.

You'll be part of a focused product team (product manager + tech lead + engineers) responsible for integrating Koalafi's platform with a third-party loan servicing system and building the internal capabilities to support the full loan lifecycle — origination, servicing, payments, and communications. You'll be doing real work on a real product from day one, not maintaining something someone else built years ago.

That said, this isn't a build-in-a-vacuum situation. The NPIL product connects to existing Koalafi systems — origination, payments, communications — and you'll need to be comfortable rolling up your sleeves and navigating code you didn't write. That's the job. The ability to read an unfamiliar codebase, understand its intent, and make a clean change is just as important as building new things.

What You'll Do

Build and Deliver

• Implement microservices and event-driven workflows to integrate Koalafi's systems with a third-party loan servicing platform
• Build and maintain REST APIs that support loan origination, payment processing, and customer servicing operations
• Navigate and contribute to existing internal services where the NPIL product intersects with current Koalafi systems — reading unfamiliar code, understanding its intent, and making clean, well-scoped changes
• Develop frontend components in React/TypeScript to support customer-facing and internal tooling as needed
• Write code that is testable, observable, and built to last — not just built to ship

Collaborate and Contribute

• Work closely with the Tech Lead on system design and integration architecture
• Partner with Product and Compliance to understand requirements and translate them into reliable, compliant implementations
• Participate in code reviews — both giving and receiving feedback with the goal of raising the bar, not just checking a box
• Engage actively in sprint ceremonies: planning, retros, standups — contribute to the team's rhythm, not just your own ticket

Maintain and Improve

• Implement monitoring and alerting at integration points so issues surface before customers notice them
• Support audit logging and data reconciliation requirements inherent to a regulated financial product
• Identify and flag technical risk early — bad news early is always better than bad news late
• Leverage AI development tools to move faster and stay consistent with team patterns

About You

• 2–4 years of professional software engineering experience
• Hands-on experience building backend services in Golang
• Working knowledge of REST APIs, HTTP/JSON patterns, API authentication including bearer tokens and OAuth flows and API Testing tools like Postman, HTTPPIe
• Experience building or contributing to frontend applications; React/TypeScript preferred
• Familiarity with AWS, Kubernetes, and cloud-native deployment patterns
• Familiarity with observability concepts and tools like Dynatrace
• Familiarity with AGILE/Scrum principles, ceremonies and JIRA
• Solid testing instincts — unit, integration, and contract testing aren't afterthoughts for you
• Comfort navigating and contributing to unfamiliar codebases — not just greenfield builds
• Strong communication skills: you can explain what you're building and why, not just how
• Location Requirement: This position requires regular in-person attendance at one of our two office locations (Richmond, VA or Arlington, VA). Candidates must already be located within a commutable distance to either location, as relocation assistance is not available at this time

Preferred Requirements

• Experience with event-driven or asynchronous messaging patterns
• Background in fintech, lending, payments, or other financial services
• Familiarity with third-party financial platforms (LoanPro, Peach, Amount, or similar)
• Experience with feature flags and gradual rollout strategies
• Interest in leveraging AI tools to accelerate development velocity
• Secret Management using AWS Secret Manager

Why choose Koalafi: A career at Koalafi means opportunities to tackle exciting challenges every single day. We take pride in a culture of innovation, trust, and ownership. You'll get outside your comfort zone, build meaningful relationships, and most of all, take charge of projects that ultimately help people get the things they need most.

Benefits:

At Koalafi, you will have a direct impact on our products and help shape the company’s success. We offer competitive compensation & benefits packages to keep you at your best:

• Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage
• 20 PTO days + 11 paid holidays
• 401(k) retirement with company matching
• Student Loan & Tuition Reimbursement 
• Commuter assistance
• Parental leave (maternal + paternal)
• Inclusion and Associate Engagement Programs

Who we are & what we value: 

• We focus on what’s most important
• We set clear expectations and deliver
• We embrace challenges to reach our full potential
• We ask, “How can this be better?”
• We move fast together