Vishal Garg wasted no time charting a new path for Better Home & Finance Holding Co. following his dramatic return to power. During a shareholder call on Tuesday afternoon, just one day after successfully regaining control of the company’s board through a contentious consent solicitation, Garg outlined an ambitious roadmap dubbed “Better 2.0.” The strategy focuses heavily on aggressive cost reduction, expanding wholesale operations and home equity lines of credit (HELOCs), and launching a future share repurchase program.

The high-stakes shareholder presentation and subsequent lengthy question-and-answer session followed weeks of internal turmoil and a leadership dispute that began when Garg was temporarily removed as CEO by the board in August. The dust from the boardroom battle settled—at least for now—after Garg and his supporting group won a consent solicitation resulting in the immediate ousting of five directors: interim CEO Daniel Lewis, Arnaud Massenet, Bhaskar Menon, Prabhu Narasimhan, and Harit Talwar. Additionally, Hugh Frater, who had previously gone on record stating he would resign if Garg ever assumed an executive role at the company, stepped down from the board effective immediately upon the removal of his peers, according to filings submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Tuesday.

As the sole remaining director following the shakeup, Garg quickly moved to re-populate the board, appointing Bing Gordon, Steven Sarracino, Paula Tuffin, and Nicholas Calamari to fill the newly opened vacancies. However, the company still faces governance hurdles ahead, noting that it has roughly 45 days to submit a plan to address a Nasdaq board-related requirement and 180 days to fully cure the issue, with Garg confirming that further additions to the board are expected.

Amid the sweeping governance changes, executive leadership is also undergoing a fundamental transformation. According to an SEC filing released Tuesday, the board officially removed Daniel Lewis as interim CEO effective Oct. 5, prompting an active search for a successor. Garg revealed during the call that the company has already identified a candidate for an interim chief executive and is in the final stages of formalizing the engagement. Furthermore, Better is conducting a broader search for a permanent CEO equipped with specialized expertise in credit, artificial intelligence, and financial technology.

While a new chief executive is brought in to helm day-to-day operations, Garg expects to remain the visible face of the company, though he did not formally disclose what his exact new title or position would be. In a characteristically candid moment during the shareholder call, Garg reflected on his leadership style and the rationale behind hiring a dedicated chief executive to run the business moving forward.

"I think that real leaders are able to lead with empathy while driving results. I’m able to drive results without empathy, and so I can’t be a real leader of the company," Garg told shareholders. "We’re going to get a real leader of the company that can drive results and take the things that I’m really, really good at, and then drive them with empathy."

With the leadership framework shifting, Garg’s immediate 90-day priorities pivot toward operational efficiency, enhancing financial performance, expanding the HELOC portfolio, and executing the planned divestiture of the company’s U.K. banking asset.

Financial restructuring sits at the heart of the Better 2.0 initiative. Garg noted that Better’s operating expenses currently hover around $65 million per quarter. Under the new cost-saving directives, the company is aggressively targeting a reduction down to roughly $50 million per quarter. Simultaneously, Better aims to boost its quarterly revenue from its current range of around $50 million to upwards of $65 million.

"If we get halfway to our goals in either direction, we’re at break-even," Garg emphasized to investors on the call.

A significant catalyst for the company’s near-term cash position is the planned sale of Better’s U.K.-based subsidiary, Birmingham Bank. Better announced on Monday that a prospective buyer consortium has already placed 10 million pounds into escrow for the proposed acquisition. Depending on the exact composition of the bank’s loan book and ongoing operations, the transaction is expected to release approximately $65 million in cash back to the parent company. Garg stated that he anticipates the bank sale will formally close within the next three to four months, pending standard regulatory approvals and closing conditions.

Once the transaction is finalized, Better expects its combined cash reserves to exceed $140 million. Consequently, Garg stated that the company does not anticipate needing to raise any additional capital through cash infusions over the next 12 months as it pushes steadily toward achieving financial break-even status.

Bolstered by these projected cash reserves and a leaner operating model, Garg also announced that Better plans to pursue a stock repurchase program "as soon as practical." He argued that the company’s current share price remains severely undervalued relative to other technology-focused mortgage and lending platforms operating in the market today.

On the operational front, Better is positioning its HELOC business to serve as a primary engine for future growth. Garg highlighted that the firm has recently secured a deal to launch its HELOC offerings directly on Credit Karma. Moreover, the company is actively working to restart business discussions with five additional household-name potential partners whose negotiations had stalled during the two-month leadership dispute that paralyzed parts of the company’s pipeline.

While Better has historically leaned heavily into direct-to-consumer lending and strategic partnerships, Garg announced that the company is now shifting to a multichannel approach, declaring that its wholesale mortgage business is moving "full speed ahead." Under the refreshed model, the lender intends to serve customers seamlessly through direct, retail, and wholesale channels. Additionally, Garg floated the conceptual idea of allowing multiple retail and wholesale brands to operate directly on the company’s underlying tech platform, likening the potential architecture to an open marketplace model.

To maximize revenue without inflating overhead, Garg stressed the necessity of improving mortgage-funnel conversion rates. He asserted that bringing lead-to-lock and lock-to-fund performance metrics up to standard industry benchmarks could effectively nearly double the company’s revenue without requiring a corresponding increase in operational expenses.

Technology will continue to play a critical role in driving those efficiencies. Better is actively leveraging artificial intelligence to lower production costs and streamline processing workflows, combining advanced large language models with machine learning capabilities and a deterministic processing engine to enhance operational consistency across the board.

Acknowledging the friction caused by the two-month leadership standoff—which began in August when the prior board removed him as CEO—Garg admitted that external business relationships experienced some turbulence during the interim period. While a handful of partnership conversations paused or shifted toward competitors, Garg struck an optimistic note regarding the state of the enterprise pipeline.

"We may have lost one or two who went and decided to pick someone else," Garg said. "But the pipeline is very full."