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Machine Learning Jobs in Goleta, CA (NOW HIRING)

Sr. Machine Learning Engineer

Goleta, CA

$112K - $154K/yr

Who We Are Looking For We're hiring a Senior Machine Learning Engineer to design and ship the next generation of voice and conversational AI agents within Realm-X. This role helps define AppFolio ...

Who We Are Looking For We're hiring a Staff Machine Learning Engineer to help move forward the ML platform that every AI initiative at AppFolio depends on -- training, fine-tuning, inference, RAG ...

Sr. Machine Learning Engineer

Santa Barbara, CA · On-site +1

$116K - $159K/yr

Who We Are Looking For We're hiring a Senior Machine Learning Engineer to design and ship the next generation of voice and conversational AI agents within Realm-X. This role helps define AppFolio ...

Who We Are Looking For We're hiring a Senior Machine Learning Engineer to design and ship the next generation of voice and conversational AI agents within Realm-X. This role helps define AppFolio ...

Toyon has openings for researchers and developers to solve challenging real-world problems using Artificial Intelligence (AI) / Machine Learning (ML) techniques. Experience in Computer Vision is ...

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Machine Learning information

See Goleta, CA salary details

$27.5K

$45.9K

$94.9K

How much do machine learning jobs pay per year?

As of Jun 23, 2026, the average yearly pay for machine learning in Goleta, CA is $45,946.00, according to ZipRecruiter salary data. Most workers in this role earn between $35,100.00 and $49,600.00 per year, depending on experience, location, and employer.

What is a $900000 AI job?

A $900,000 AI job typically refers to a high-level position in artificial intelligence, such as a senior machine learning engineer, AI research director, or chief AI officer, often requiring advanced skills in deep learning, data analysis, and programming. These roles usually involve leadership responsibilities, strategic planning, and may require extensive experience and specialized certifications, with compensation reflecting the seniority and impact of the role.

What is a Machine Learning job?

A Machine Learning job involves developing algorithms and models that enable computers to learn from data and make predictions or decisions without explicit programming. Professionals in this field work with large datasets, design and train machine learning models, and optimize them for performance and accuracy. Roles often require knowledge of programming languages like Python or R, experience with frameworks like TensorFlow or PyTorch, and an understanding of statistics and data science principles. Machine learning engineers and data scientists collaborate with software developers and domain experts to build AI-driven solutions for various industries.

What engineers make $500,000?

Senior machine learning engineers with extensive experience, advanced skills in deep learning and data science, and often working in high-demand industries or at large tech companies can earn salaries of $500,000 or more, especially when including bonuses and stock options. Achieving this level typically requires a strong educational background, specialized certifications, and a track record of impactful projects.

What are some typical day-to-day responsibilities in a Machine Learning role?

As a machine learning professional, your daily tasks may include data preprocessing, developing and training models, evaluating performance metrics, and experimenting with algorithms to optimize results. You’ll often collaborate closely with data scientists, software engineers, and business stakeholders to align technical solutions with organizational goals. Regular activities can also involve deploying models to production, monitoring performance, and troubleshooting any issues that arise post-deployment. Staying up to date with recent ML research and participating in team discussions or code reviews are also common parts of the job.

What jobs can I get with machine learning?

With a background in machine learning, you can pursue roles such as machine learning engineer, data scientist, AI researcher, or data analyst. These jobs typically require skills in programming languages like Python or R, knowledge of algorithms, and experience with tools like TensorFlow or PyTorch.

What are the key skills and qualifications needed to thrive in the Machine Learning position, and why are they important?

To thrive in Machine Learning, you need a solid background in mathematics, statistics, programming (especially Python or R), and a formal degree in computer science, data science, or a related field. Experience with popular ML frameworks (such as TensorFlow, PyTorch, or Scikit-learn), version control, and relevant certifications like AWS Certified Machine Learning are highly valued. Strong problem-solving skills, curiosity, clear communication, and the ability to work both independently and within multidisciplinary teams make candidates stand out. These skills and qualities are essential for developing robust models, staying updated with technology advancements, and collaborating effectively on complex projects.

Which 3 jobs will survive AI?

Machine learning engineers, data scientists, and AI ethics specialists are likely to continue thriving as AI advances, due to their expertise in developing, managing, and overseeing AI systems. These roles require specialized skills, critical thinking, and understanding of complex algorithms that are difficult to fully automate. Continuous learning and certification in relevant tools like Python, TensorFlow, or ethical frameworks will support job security in these fields.
What are popular job titles related to Machine Learning jobs in Goleta, CA? For Machine Learning jobs in Goleta, CA, the most frequently searched job titles are:
What job categories do people searching Machine Learning jobs in Goleta, CA look for? The top searched job categories for Machine Learning jobs in Goleta, CA are:
What cities near Goleta, CA are hiring for Machine Learning jobs? Cities near Goleta, CA with the most Machine Learning job openings:
Infographic showing various Machine Learning job openings in Goleta, CA as of June 2026, with employment types broken down into 100% Full Time. Highlights an 100% In-person job distribution, with an average salary of $45,946 per year, or $22.1 per hour.

Principal Machine Learning Engineer

AppFolio

Goleta, CA

Full-time

Posted 24 days ago


Job description

Hi, We're AppFolio
We're innovators, changemakers, and collaborators. We're more than just a software company — we're building the AI-native platform where the real estate industry comes to do business. We're transforming Property Management; how property managers operate, how residents live, and how intelligence flows across an entire industry.
Realm-X is AppFolio's AI-native platform powering this transformation. It enables a new generation of intelligent capabilities across our products, including Realm-X Assistant (copilot), Flows (AI Agentic workflows) and Performers (autonomous AI Agents). Realm-X serves as both a foundation for internal teams to build and scale AI-powered products, and a core layer delivering intelligent, high-impact experiences directly to our customers.
At its core, Realm-X is built on a structured domain ontology and a set of shared business primitives—such as transactions, actions, reports, metrics, and skills—that enable AI systems to deeply understand and operate across the full context of property management workflows. This foundation allows us to build context-aware, action-oriented AI systems that go beyond simple assistance to power real automation and decision-making.
Who We Are Looking For
We're seeking a Principal Machine Learning Engineer to help define and lead the next generation of AI systems within Realm-X, and to drive AppFolio's long-term autonomous Real Estate Performance Management (RPM) platform — autonomous AI agents that can deliver property management performance.
This is a company-impact role. You will own mission-critical AI capabilities, shape long-term technical strategy, and act as a technical visionary and advisor across teams and leadership.
You'll operate at the intersection of traditional machine learning, deep learning, and generative AI, building systems that go beyond AI assistance into execution, automation, and optimization.
This role is for someone who doesn't just build systems — but redefines how they should be built.
Your Impact
  • Architect & Lead: Help define the technical vision and architecture for AI systems across Realm-X in partnership with senior leadership.
  • Scale Intelligent AI Agents: Design and deploy advanced AI Agentic systems that combine reasoning, planning, and execution, including multi-agent orchestration across specialist agents (e.g., maintenance, leasing, accounting, collections).
  • Improve the Foundation: Establish platform primitives and abstractions to enable context-aware, action-oriented AI that goes beyond simple assistance to true automation. Improve the standards for end-to-end ML systems: data collection, model training, evaluation, deployment, and inference infrastructure.
  • Production Excellence: Architect and build scalable, multi-modal, and real-time AI applications, ensuring high-quality deployment standards.
  • ML for Autonomous Property Management: Drive AppFolio's transition toward autonomous property management operations. Use existing LLMs today and instrument the proprietary data collection now that will let us selectively train, fine-tune, and RL-optimize open source LLM and SLM for the RPM domain — optimizing performance, latency, and cost.
  • Reinforcement Learning for Agent Policies: Build the data and feedback loops needed to enable Reinforcement Learning over agent action policies in the partially observable, high-stakes property management environment.
Qualifications
  • Systems thinker: You think in terms of systems, platforms, and long-term leverage, not just features.
  • Production builder: You've built and scaled ML/AI systems in production with meaningful business impact.
  • Ambiguity: You operate effectively in high ambiguity, turning unclear problems into a clear direction.
  • Influence: You've led or influenced large, cross-team technical initiatives.
  • Originality: You introduce new ideas, architectures, or paradigms — not just implement existing ones.
  • Owner-operator: You bring a founder / owner-operator mindset: you take ownership, act with urgency, and focus on outcomes.
  • Pace: You have a strong desire to move fast and deliver impact, while maintaining sound engineering judgment.
  • Collaboration: You are humble, collaborative, and low-ego, and you elevate those around you.
  • Sustainability: You value work-life balance as a foundation for sustained high performance.
  • Vertical conviction: You bring genuine interest in winning a specific industry vertical (real estate) rather than chasing horizontal AI hype.
Must Have
  • Master's or Ph.D. in Computer Science, Machine Learning, or a related field (required).
  • 10+ years of experience building software systems, with significant focus on ML/AI (or equivalent impact).
  • Combined academic and industry track record: Published research and shipped production systems.
  • Deep ML expertise: Traditional Machine Learning, Deep Learning, and Generative AI / LLMs (prompting, fine-tuning, RAG, agents, tool and skills use).
  • LLM post-training: Direct, hands-on experience with LLM post-training — SFT, RLHF, DPO, and/or RL — at non-trivial scale.
  • Full ML lifecycle: Strong understanding of data extraction, model training, evaluation, deployment, and integration into production software.
  • Core stack: Expert in Python, PyTorch, NumPy, AWS, Docker, SQL, embeddings, and RAG.
  • Agent tooling: Experience with LangChain, LangGraph, and LLM observability tools (LangSmith).
  • Production ML at scale: Experience designing and operating production-grade ML systems at scale.
  • Ontology & knowledge graphs: Applied experience with ontology-driven systems, knowledge graphs, or semantic layers used to model business domains for AI systems.
  • AI-native engineering: Proficiency with AI coding tools and workflows (e.g., Copilot, ChatGPT, code generation tools).
Nice to Have
  • Reinforcement Learning depth: Deep RL expertise applied to sequential decision-making under partial observability.
  • Experience designing evaluation and benchmarking systems for AI.
  • Background in distributed systems and real-time architectures.
  • Experience building platforms used by multiple engineering teams.
  • Contributions to industry thought leadership (publications, talks, open source, etc.).
Location
Find out more about our locations by visiting our site. 
Compensation & Benefits
The compensation that we reasonably expect to pay for this role is: $264,000 - $330,000 base pay. The actual compensation for this role will be determined by a variety of factors, including but not limited to the candidate’s skills, education, experience, and internal equity.
Please note that compensation is just one aspect of a comprehensive Total Rewards package. The compensation range listed here does not include additional benefits or any discretionary bonuses you may be eligible for based on your role and/or employment type.
Regular full-time employees are eligible for benefits - see here.

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