Better Home & Finance’s fight with founder Vishal Garg is moving closer to a shareholder decision, but the dispute increasingly centers on a larger question for the mortgage fintech: Can Better preserve Garg’s technology strategy without restoring his control?
Institutional Shareholder Services and Glass Lewis have recommended that shareholders oppose Garg’s campaign to remove five of Better’s eight directors. Egan-Jones Proxy Services backed him, finding that Better’s improving performance before his removal supported giving the founder renewed influence.
The split marks the latest turn in a dispute that began after Better removed Garg as CEO in August. Garg responded by seeking to remove five directors, including interim CEO Daniel Lewis. Better then sued Garg over alleged securities-law violations and adopted a shareholder-rights plan commonly called a poison pill.
None of Better’s allegations against Garg have been adjudicated. Courts in New York and Delaware declined to grant emergency relief sought by the opposing sides, but neither court decided the underlying claims.
The latest filings reveal an unusual convergence. Garg now acknowledges that Better needs a professional permanent CEO, while the board is continuing much of the product and distribution strategy developed under him.
Both sides are emphasizing Tinman, wholesale distribution, home equity lending, AI-driven efficiency, cost reductions, and the sale of Better’s U.K. bank. The disagreement is increasingly over who can execute that strategy and how much authority Garg should retain.
Tinman Leader Leaves For UWM
That execution question has become more pressing following the departure of Leah Price, the general manager hired to lead Better’s Tinman AI platform.
Better confirmed that Price has left the company. She is expected to join United Wholesale Mortgage’s technology team later this month in an innovation role.
Price joined Better in June 2025 after holding fintech and AI positions at the Federal Housing Finance Agency, Figure Technologies and Fannie Mae. Better hired her specifically to help bring Tinman to outside lenders and brokers.
NMP reported at the time that Better considered Price’s experience across regulation, mortgage operations, and financial technology central to expanding the platform.
Garg cited her departure as a reason shareholders should question Better’s direction. Better said Price’s decision was unrelated to the leadership transition or governance dispute and objected to using her departure to advance the proxy campaign.
Better must now prepare its TinmanGo wholesale program without the executive it hired to lead Tinman’s expansion across the mortgage industry.
Glass Lewis Criticizes Both Sides
Glass Lewis concluded that Garg had not made a sufficiently compelling case for removing five directors, according to excerpts released by both Better and the Garg Group.
The adviser cited Better’s losses, the decline in shareholder value following its public listing, and Garg’s responsibility for the company’s performance during his tenure.
But Glass Lewis also found “legitimate grounds for criticism” of the board’s handling of the leadership transition, according to materials filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Glass Lewis questioned Lewis’ elevation to interim CEO shortly after he joined the board. It also criticized the board’s subsequent adoption of the poison pill and attempt to obtain emergency federal injunctive relief against Garg’s campaign.
The adviser also undercut one of Better’s recurring arguments. Better has criticized Garg for seeking to remove five directors without identifying replacements. Glass Lewis noted that Better’s consent process does not allow Garg to remove and replace directors simultaneously, meaning the absence of a slate should not automatically render his campaign incomplete.
Even with those concerns, Glass Lewis found that Garg had not shown that removing five directors and potentially returning to an executive role would offer shareholders a sufficiently clear path to a better outcome.
Glass Lewis joined ISS, which previously found that Better’s decision to remove Garg appeared defensible. ISS also concluded that Garg had not established the need for a board overhaul.
Egan-Jones reached the opposite conclusion.
According to excerpts released by the Garg Group, Egan-Jones questioned the timing and explanation for Garg’s removal and said the board had not demonstrated that the leadership transition would produce greater shareholder value.
It also pointed to Better’s more recent operating and stock performance, concluding that Garg’s role in developing the strategy gave him a stronger ability to execute it.
Better and Garg each published selected excerpts supporting their positions.
Better Keeps Much Of Garg’s Strategy
The opposing campaigns increasingly agree on Better’s broad direction.
Garg’s 90-day plan targets $2 billion in quarterly funded-loan volume, monthly break-even, additional HELOC partnerships, and AI-enabled cost reductions. It also calls for selling Birmingham Bank, Better’s U.K. subsidiary, and using available capital to support a $30 million share repurchase, subject to legal requirements and market conditions.
Better’s current leadership is focusing on wholesale distribution through TinmanGo, HELOC-based remarketing, and partnerships with consumer platforms.
Lewis has acknowledged that Better’s previous partnership approach was “broken,” saying the company relied on customized integrations without building the sales and customer-support infrastructure required to produce repeatable distribution.
That admission followed a Better board disclosure that several partnerships promoted earlier this year had generated less than $50,000 each. NMP previously examined what those results mean for Better’s partner-led growth strategy.
Better has since said an unnamed new partnership produced the strongest initial locked-loan performance of any partnership launch in its history. Better also says it is preparing to launch a wholesale program powered by TinmanGo.
The leadership dispute therefore comes at a pivotal point for Better’s mortgage strategy. The company is attempting to move beyond direct-to-consumer lending by selling its technology and fulfillment capabilities to brokers and other lenders, but it has yet to establish that those channels can consistently produce meaningful, profitable volume.
Garg Calls For More Aggressive Automation
Garg has criticized Better’s planned portal-based wholesale approach and argued that Tinman should automate more of the mortgage process.
In remarks subsequently included in an SEC filing, Garg questioned whether brokers needed another proprietary portal. He said AI should instead take over more repetitive processing and underwriting work rather than handing files to employees for manual review.
He said originators, processors, underwriters, and other employees who solve borrower problems would become more valuable, while repetitive document comparison and data-entry work would increasingly disappear.
Garg also claimed that NEO Home Loans originators using Better’s technology had increased loan production and commission income. Better has not publicly released figures supporting that claim.
The two camps are offering different versions of Better’s AI strategy: a standardized wholesale platform under current management or more aggressive automation and embedded distribution under a board influenced by Garg.
For brokers, that difference could determine whether TinmanGo becomes another lender portal or technology that operates behind their existing workflows.
Garg Outlines A Narrower Role
Garg has also clarified that he is not seeking to become Better’s permanent CEO.
He said a reconstituted board would eventually replace Lewis, hire a professional CEO, and bring Garg back as chairman or chief product officer.
The permanent CEO would manage employees and company operations, Garg said, while he would concentrate on technology, products, and innovation.
The proposal amounts to a concession that Better needs different day-to-day leadership. But it also raises a governance question: Whether an independent CEO could control the company while its founder maintained substantial influence over the board, product strategy, technology, and partnerships.
Better argues that Garg should have no future operating role. Lewis also said qualified permanent-CEO candidates have declined to participate in Better’s search because of concerns about Garg’s continued influence.
The board’s current position reverses an offer made shortly after Garg’s removal. Better proposed giving him a vice-chairman and advisory role potentially worth more than $15 million. The offer was not completed.
Turnaround Claims Remain Difficult To Measure
Better says its current plan has produced more than $45 million in annualized cost reductions. It has not disclosed how much cash has already been saved, which business functions absorbed the cuts, or whether originator and operations staffing was affected.
Garg’s plan identifies about $2 million in possible monthly reductions through changes to compensation on AI-assisted conversions, instant counteroffers, and increased use of AI in legal and litigation work.
Those figures are projections that Better has not confirmed.
Both sides also support selling Birmingham Bank. The sale process has been active since at least April, but Better has not identified a buyer, disclosed a signed agreement, or provided a closing date.
Garg has cited approximately $74 million in anticipated gross proceeds and proposed completing the sale within 30 days of a board transition, subject to finding a buyer and obtaining regulatory approvals. Better has called that timetable unrealistic.
Shareholders are therefore being asked to choose between competing turnaround claims without a full quarter of results under Lewis, measurable TinmanGo performance, or evidence that Garg’s proposed savings could be achieved.
Vote Count Remains Undisclosed
Garg is seeking to remove Lewis and directors Harit Talwar, Arnaud Massenet, Bhaskar Menon, and Prabhu Narasimhan. Garg, former Fannie Mae CEO Hugh Frater, and Michael Farello would remain if the proposal succeeds.
Garg initially claimed he already had support from shareholders representing a voting majority. His subsequent SEC filing acknowledged that the written consents delivered on his behalf fell short, prompting the formal solicitation now underway.
His group initially set Sept. 18 as a collection target and later moved that target to Oct. 2. Garg has said in SEC-filed social-media transcripts that shareholders technically have until Oct. 26 to submit consents.
Neither side has disclosed the current vote count.
The proxy-adviser split gives shareholders arguments for either outcome. But for Better’s mortgage partners and prospective brokers, the larger issue is whether the company can finally turn Tinman into a repeatable distribution business while its founder, board, and key technology leadership continue to change.
