Building a Stripe Connect marketplace with Next.js and Supabase
How we ship two-sided marketplaces: live inventory, Connect payouts, and paperwork buyers actually need.
Two-sided marketplaces fail when search, payments, and trust are bolted on late. At Mechabits we treat them as one product: discovery that reflects real availability, checkout that clears funds correctly, and documents that match how the buyer gets reimbursed or reports spend.
A typical stack we ship is Next.js for the product web, Supabase for auth and Postgres, and Stripe Checkout plus Stripe Connect for traveler or buyer payments and host or seller payouts. Connect is what lets the platform take a fee while moving money to many recipients without building a bank.
Availability has to be honest. Showing “request to book” for every listing trains users to leave. We model calendars and inventory so search results mean the dates are bookable — the same discipline we used on TDY Direct for 30+ night military lodging near Maxwell AFB.
Compliance paperwork is a product feature, not a PDF afterthought. Itemized folios, tax lines, and clear status emails reduce support load and make B2B or government buyers more willing to pay. Pair that with host onboarding, payout readiness checks, and audit-friendly logs, and the marketplace can grow without rewriting payments every quarter.