According to HousingWire, Better founder Vishal Garg says he has secured more than half the votes in a consent solicitation that would dramatically reshape the company's leadership. The effort, which Garg has been pushing since his removal as CEO in early August, now moves to a confirmation phase with a third-party election inspector reviewing the submitted votes. Garg made these statements during a board meeting where he and his legal counsel laid out what comes next if the vote tally is officially verified.
The consent solicitation, if confirmed, would remove five current board members including interim CEO Daniel Lewis and four other directors. During the meeting, these five directors agreed to refrain from taking any corporate actions or putting forward new candidates while the inspection process moves forward. This interim period appears designed to prevent any moves that could complicate the transition if Garg's campaign is validated.
Garg has already outlined a 90-day plan he intends to implement once the results are confirmed. The plan includes appointing two new board members from the venture capital world, raising the company's annual cost-cutting targets from what the company had previously set, bringing in an operational adviser, and significantly expanding the home equity lending business. These moves represent a fairly aggressive shift in strategy compared to the current board's direction.
The confirmation stage is the key hurdle remaining. Garg's team submitted the votes to the election inspector on Wednesday afternoon and indicated they expect results within about a day, though as of Thursday afternoon confirmation had not yet been announced. Better's leadership has declined to comment publicly on the situation, keeping their response out of the spotlight for now.
This whole situation really captures the broader tension we're seeing in the fintech mortgage space right now. Better's been under real pressure, and leadership disputes like this one tend to create uncertainty for everyone involved, from employees to customers. If Garg does get his confirmation and pushes through these changes, it'll be worth watching how that affects Better's lending activity and competitiveness here in the Bay Area and across California, where we all compete for the same borrowers and deals.
