Principal AI Software Engineer

Walker & Dunlop; United States; On-site; USD 250,000 - 300,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health Savings Account

401(k) + match

Transit benefits

Job summary

Walker & Dunlop invites a Principal AI Software Engineer to join WDTech, our in-house AI development team, shaping the AI-driven Loan Origination and Servicing platform. You will design scalable, real-time AI workflows and contribute to Atlas, our collaborative AI platform powering reusable skills and agents across WDTech.

You will lead end-to-end AI initiatives, mentor teammates, and advance model routing, evaluation, and reliability practices. A hybrid work model is available.

Qualifications

• 12+ years of software development experience including senior IC delivering production systems.
• Extensive experience delivering production AI/ML systems including LLM-powered applications and agentic workflows.
• Experience with prompt and context engineering, including RAG, embeddings, hybrid search and reranking.

Responsibilities

• Own AI/platform initiatives end-to-end, delivering business-facing capabilities while strengthening the underlying context and agent platform.
• Design, build and maintain agentic workflows for loan intake, document review and servicing.
• Define platform patterns and scale them for broader adoption by productionizing use cases.
• Lead model selection and routing, evaluating models based on cost, latency and quality.
• Design interfaces and capabilities used by other teams (MCP tool servers, agent handoffs, subagents, human-in-the-loop checks).
• Establish evaluation and reliability practices, including evaluation sets and regression testing.
• Operate with minimal oversight, identify risks, and mentor others.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

Skills

Python

FastAPI

SQL

LLM integration

Education

Bachelor's or Master's in Computer Science or related field

Tools

Claude Agent SDK

LangGraph

Pydantic AI

MCP

A2A

Job description

Department: WDTech - R&D

We are Walker & Dunlop. We are one of the largest providers of capital to the commercial real estate industry, enabling real estate owners and operators to bring their visions of communities — where people live, work, shop, and play — to life. We are committed to creating meaningful social, environmental, and economic change in our communities.

Department Overview

WDTech is W&D’s in-house technology team – a group of collaborative and highly skilled technology professionals, all of whom are leading experts in real estate data, data science, and technology. WDTech Engineering builds solutions that impact not only our products but also the people and processes across our organization. A commitment to innovation and a passion for disrupting the old-fashioned real estate industry are our highest priorities.

The Impact You Will Have

As a Principal AI Software Engineer on our AI Development Team, you will help shape the future of our Loan Origination and Servicing platform and the AI systems that support how we build, deploy, and operate software across the business. You will design scalable applications, intelligent workflows and agentic systems that deliver real-time insights and improve operational efficiency for our teams and clients. You will also contribute to Atlas, our AI collaboration platform that powers reusable skills, agents and AI capabilities across WDTech. This role requires deep technical expertise, sound judgment and the ability to independently solve complex problems, ship reliable solutions and raise the engineering bar through your work and mentorship.

Primary Responsibilities

• Own complex AI and platform initiatives end-to-end, delivering business-facing capabilities while strengthening the underlying context and agent platform.


• Design, build and maintain agentic workflows for business-critical processes such as loan intake, document review and servicing.


• Help establish new platform patterns and capabilities by defining approaches, proving them through production use cases and scaling them for broader adoption.


• Lead model selection and routing, evaluating models based on cost, latency and quality, and evolving solutions as new models and capabilities become available.


• Design interfaces and capabilities used by other teams, including MCP tool servers, agent handoffs, subagents, long-running state and human-in-the-loop checkpoints.


• Establish evaluation and reliability practices, including evaluation sets, LLM-as-judge approaches where appropriate, regression testing and ongoing performance measurement.


• Operate with minimal oversight, proactively identifying risks, making sound technical trade-offs and escalating when needed, while raising the engineering bar through collaboration and mentorship.


• Perform other duties as assigned.

Attendance is generally required from 8:30 am – 5:30 pm local time, Tuesday through Thursday, with the option to work remotely on Mondays and Fridays.

Education and Experience

12+ years of software development experience, including experience as a senior individual contributor delivering production systems. Bachelor’s or master’s degree in Computer Science or a related field, or equivalent experience. Extensive experience delivering production AI/ML systems, including LLM-powered applications and agentic workflows. Deep experience with modern agent frameworks and SDKs, such as Claude Agent SDK, LangGraph and Pydantic AI, as well as MCP and A2A. Experience with prompt and context engineering, including RAG, embeddings, hybrid search and reranking. Experience with model evaluation, observability and guardrails for production AI systems. Experience using agentic development tools, including skills, subagents and harness configurations. Experience in Real Estate, Financial Services or Capital Markets preferred.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities

• Deep proficiency in Python and modern backend frameworks such as FastAPI, with a strong focus on scalable and maintainable architecture.


• Strong expertise with SQL databases, including schema design, query optimization and performance tuning.


• Experience testing non-deterministic systems, including LLM call fixtures, evaluation suites and strategies for controlling flaky behavior.


• Strong judgment in determining which capabilities belong within a shared platform versus individual applications.


• Ability to operate effectively in ambiguity, establish emerging patterns and independently move from business problem definition through solution delivery.


• Experience with Event Sourcing and Domain-Driven Design principles.


• Excellent verbal and written communication skills.


• Ability to show ownership of your work, take on challenges and acknowledge growth opportunities, and demonstrate patience when learning new processes.


• Courtesy, respect, and thoughtfulness in teaming with colleagues and other stakeholders.

Career development opportunities

Career development opportunities. Empowerment and encouragement to give back – volunteer hours and donation matching.

Salary and Compensation

This position has an estimated base salary of $250,000 - $300,000 plus a discretionary bonus. An employment offer is based on the applicant’s relevant work experience, applicable knowledge, skills, abilities, internal equity, and alignment with market data.

What We Offer

The opportunity to join one of Fortune Magazine’s Great Places to Work winners Comprehensive benefit options* that have earned Walker & Dunlop the gold level of the 2025 Cigna Healthy Workforce Designation™, some of which include:

• Up to 83% subsidized medical payroll deductions


• Competitive dental and vision benefits


• 401(k) + match


• Pre-tax transit and commuting benefits


• A robust health and wellness program – earn cash rewards and gain access to resources that promote health, engagement, and balance


• Paid maternity and parental leave, as well as other family paid leave programs


• Company-paid life, short and long-term disability insurance


• Health Savings Account and Healthcare and Dependent Care Flexible Spending


• Career development opportunities


• Empowerment and encouragement to give back – volunteer hours and donation matching

*Eligibility may vary based on average number of hours worked.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

We are committed to equity in all steps of the recruitment and employment experience. We believe in equal access to opportunities in our workplace. We do not tolerate discrimination, including harassment, based on any characteristic protected by applicable law, such as race, color, national origin, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, sex, age, disability, veteran or military status, and genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. We strive to be a safe place to ask questions, build professional relationships, and develop careers.

Fair Chance Hiring

Background checks, including any questions related to infractions, arrests, or conviction records, will not be conducted until after a conditional offer of employment has been accepted. We will consider for employment qualified applicants regardless of arrest and conviction records, in accordance with federal, state, and local laws.

Company culture and values

Our experience is the combination of everything that’s unique about our culture, our core values, our company meetings, our commitment to success, our recognition programs, but most importantly, it’s our people. Our employees are self-disciplined, hardworking, curious, trustworthy, humble and truthful. They make choices according to what is best for the team, they live for opportunities to collaborate and make a difference, and they make us the #1 Top Workplace in our area.