Better Home & Finance (NASDAQ:BETR) executives used the company’s fourth-quarter and full-year 2025 earnings call to highlight a strategic shift from a direct-to-consumer (D2C) mortgage originator toward what founder and CEO Vishal Garg described as a “vertical AI platform” for the broader mortgage ecosystem.
Management emphasized growing adoption of its Tinman AI platform across partnerships, including a large consumer distribution deal with Intuit Credit Karma, expansion with retail mortgage teams through Neo, a new rollout with a top-five U.S. non-bank mortgage originator, and early-stage ramping with reverse mortgage lender Finance of America. Better also announced what it called the first conversational credit decision engine integrated into ChatGPT via a Tinman AI app, which management said has generated inbound interest from dozens of financial institutions.
Strategic shift toward platform partnerships
New CFO Loveen Advani, who joined the call for his first earnings as finance chief, said the shift has meaningful financial implications because enterprise partnerships have longer ramp timelines but “far greater volume potential” and “far better marginal economics” than the legacy D2C model. Advani noted that Tinman AI platform contribution was 0% of funded volume in 2024, rose to 35% in 2025, and the company sees “a clear path” to over 60% of loan volume coming from Tinman AI platform business in 2026.
Partnership updates: Credit Karma, Neo, and new enterprise ramps
On Credit Karma, Garg said Better went live in the Credit Karma app in October 2025 after more than nine months of work and has “only penetrated less than 1%” of the eligible monthly user base so far. The integration brings Credit Karma member data—such as credit, income and home attributes—into Tinman AI. In Q&A, management said the partnership started with refinance and is expected to expand to HELOC and then purchase.
Better also discussed its work with Neo and local loan officer teams using Tinman AI. Garg said Neo grew from a $1.5 billion run rate when it joined to a $2.4 billion run rate at the end of 2025 on the Tinman platform, with 28 new loan officer teams onboarded in 2025. He added that within six months of a full rollout, Neo increased funded loans per mortgage advisor by 91%, per processor by 17%, and per underwriter by nearly 50%.
Additional partnership updates included:
- Top-five U.S. non-bank mortgage originator: Garg said the partner went live in February with 2% of its loan officers on Tinman AI, with work underway to expand to 3,000+ loan officers.
- Finance of America: Management said the partnership is in early stages, launching HELOC and HELOAN offerings powered by Tinman AI to reach the senior market.
- Top-three personal lending fintech (pilot): Garg said the relationship is in pilot and initially expected to resemble the Credit Karma model, with Better originating, though the fintech’s affiliated bank may choose to onboard to its own balance sheet.
When asked to rank the opportunity among ramping partners, Garg said the order is Credit Karma Home Loans powered by Better, then the top-five non-bank originator, followed by Finance of America and the top-three fintech.
ChatGPT integration and sales cycle expectations
Better announced what it called the first conversational credit decision engine for mortgages and home equity loans integrated into ChatGPT through a Tinman AI app. Garg said loan officers, banks, and fintechs can receive “decision-ready credit outputs” in as little as 47 seconds, which he said reduces origination timelines by an average of 21 days. He also said Better is the only application authorized to display credit decisions within ChatGPT, powered by proprietary MCP technology built on top of Tinman.
Since the OpenAI announcement, Garg said Better received inbound interest from “over 40” financial institutions within days, and later noted interest from “over 45” institutions in the U.S. and internationally. He argued that ChatGPT could reduce integration timelines for institutions because it is an interface many internal teams already know, potentially shortening a full implementation cycle from roughly nine months to about six months, and as low as three months for institutions without legacy constraints.
Financial results and outlook
For the fourth quarter of 2025, Better reported funded loan volume of approximately $1.5 billion and revenue of approximately $44 million, up 56% and 77% year-over-year, respectively. Tinman AI platform generated $646 million in volume in the quarter—over 40% of total volume—surpassing the company’s prior guidance of $600 million, according to Garg. For full-year 2025, Better reported $4.7 billion in funded loan volume and $165 million in revenue, up 32% and 52% year-over-year, respectively.
Advani said that in Q4, total net revenue increased 77% year-over-year while expenses were approximately flat, which he said demonstrated operating leverage. He also said loan contribution margin improved 28% quarter-over-quarter from approximately $1,800 to approximately $2,300 per loan, reflecting integrated AI across sales and operations workflows.
Better posted an adjusted EBITDA loss of approximately $24 million in Q4 2025, compared to a $28 million loss in Q4 of the prior year and a $25 million loss in the prior quarter. Management reiterated its target to achieve adjusted EBITDA breakeven by the end of Q3 2026, while noting progress may not be linear due to differing partnership ramp timelines.
On liquidity and financing, Advani said the company ended Q4 2025 with $227 million in cash, restricted cash, short-term investments, and assets held for sale. Better had three warehouse facilities totaling $575 million in capacity as of Dec. 31, 2025.
For Q1 2026, Better guided for total loan volume of $1.4 billion to $1.55 billion, with the midpoint representing 70% year-over-year growth from Q1 2025. In Q&A, management attributed the roughly flat sequential midpoint versus Q4 to seasonality, while maintaining its expectation of reaching $1 billion in total monthly loan volume by May 2026.
Management also discussed efforts to lower funding costs, including work toward a tokenized credit facility within a stablecoin ecosystem that Garg said could lower funding costs by up to 100 basis points once implemented. He said the company is “six months away” from when it starts to impact the bottom line.
About Better Home & Finance (NASDAQ:BETR)
Better Home & Finance Holding Co engages in the provision of comprehensive homeownership services. It offers mortgage loans, real estate agent services, and title and homeowner’s insurance services. The company was founded in 2014 and is headquartered in New York, NY.
