Founding AI Engineer at Kelly Services
Charlotte, NC
$100,000–$180,000from the description
Jul 28, 2026
Charlotte, NC
Jul 29, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A Charlotte-based private real estate investment firm is hiring its first AI engineer to design and build AI infrastructure from the ground up. The role centers on architecting RAG pipelines, multi-agent systems, and LLM-powered workflows that support deal sourcing, investment analysis, and asset management. It is a fully on-site, high-ownership position working closely with firm leadership to translate business needs into production AI systems.
Senior level · 3+ years · Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC · Full-time
“or” means any one of them counts — you don't need all of them.
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
How this req sits in the market our data
Roughly 85 people in the Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC area plausibly meet what this posting asks for (software developers). range 50–130
Applicant volume Moderate — A normal amount of company. The rare requirements below are what will separate a shortlisted application from the rest.
Rare in this occupation — lead with these, and say what you built with them.
Most people in this occupation already list these. Still required — just not what gets you shortlisted.
What the occupation pays Median $138,909 (middle half $110,048–$168,680). This posting is about at that midpoint.
Estimated from BLS employment for this occupation and area, per-skill prevalence across our listing corpus, and published wage benchmarks — as of Jul 29, 2026. It is a model, not a headcount.
Why we read it this way (6)
The title 'Founding AI Engineer' carries no explicit seniority level, so advertised seniority is Unspecified; however, the scope (owning the full AI technical roadmap solo, working directly with leadership, building production systems from scratch) supports a Senior classification.
The 3+ years of experience requirement appears under 'Desired Skills & Experience' rather than 'Required Skills & Experience', so it is technically preferred rather than a hard gate — however, it is the only stated experience figure and has been used as the overall years minimum as the best available signal.
A BS or MS in Computer Science or related field is listed under 'Desired Skills & Experience' only, so the degree requirement is set to None.
The role is explicitly on-site 5 days a week in Charlotte, NC.
Compensation range ($100,000–$180,000) is stated at the top of the posting without an explicit 'per year' label, but the magnitude and context make an annual basis unambiguous — reported as Year.
The alt SOC 15-1299 (Computer Occupations, All Other) is noted because 'AI Engineer' is an emerging occupation not yet cleanly captured by any single BLS code; 15-1252 Software Developers is the closest fit given the primary focus on building and shipping production AI systems.
Read the full posting
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