clear plan and shared sense of purpose. It comes from the opportunities I see to grow this business, and it comes from my belief that Better has the people, technology, and foundation to execute if we remain disciplined and focused. We will build partnerships we can support properly and put our engineers on the work that matters most. Better exists to solve deeply human problems, helping someone buy a first home, giving a growing family more space, enabling a retiree to lower monthly payments, or allowing a business owner to invest by unlocking home equity. The strongest impression I formed at Better was not about the technology. It was about the people who do that work. Finally, I want to thank Vishal Gard. Better would not exist without his vision, and the technology we are discussing today is the product of years of investment and innovation under his leadership. I appreciate his partnership through this transition. With that, I'll turn the call over to Levine.

Thank you, Daniel, for clearly laying out the priorities ahead. We look forward to supporting you on their execution. On the macro environment, the rate backdrop got more difficult as the quarter progressed, and mortgage application activity has softened industry-wide. We don't expect this to be a short-term blip. We're planning for an elevated rate environment to persist over the medium term and we're adapting accordingly. Despite the macro environment in Q2, betters loan volume grew 38% year-over-year to $1.67 billion and total net revenues increased 28% year-over-year and 15% quarter-over-quarter to $54.7 million. This quarter, HILAC represented 18% of our loan volume, up from 12% last quarter. That's a direct reflection of how we're responding to this rate backdrop. HELOCs enable homeowners to access liquidity without giving up a lower rate that they have already locked in. Even though HELOCs carry smaller average loan sizes than first liens, they generate higher average revenue per loan, so they have an outsized impact on revenue. Turning to NIO, in Q2, our NIO business grew 60% in loan volume year over year and continues to recruit top loan officer teams across the country. In Q2, our adjusted EBITDA loss was $14 million. This $14 million loss is a 39% improvement year over year and a 26% improvement quarter over quarter. The adjusted EBITDA benefits from a one-time $6.5 million trade reserve release related to loans originated prior to June 2022. Looking at product trends in Q2, refinance loan volume grew 239% year-over-year to $549 million. Home equity volume grew 23% year-over-year to $294 million, and purchase loan volumes grew 3% year-over-year to $824 million. By product mix, refinance made up 33% of Q2 loan volume, home equity made up 18% of Q2 loan volume, and purchase made up 49% of Q2 loan volume. By channel in Q2, 55% of loan volume came from the TinMan AI platform and 45% from direct to consumer. Now turning to third quarter guidance, we expect loan volumes of 1.375 billion to 1.525 billion, of which the midpoint represents 20% growth year over year. We expect total net revenues of 49 million to 52 million, of which the midpoint represents a 22% growth year-over-year. We also expect an adjusted EBITDA loss in the range of $18 million to $15 million, of which the midpoint represents a 28% improvement year-over-year. The range is wider than in prior quarters for two reasons. Refinance volume is more rate-sensitive at current levels, and our revenue mix is actively shifting towards HELOCs. As our HELOC partnerships ramp and season, we expect that product to become a more predictable contributor to give us better visibility into our forecast. Building on Daniel's earlier statement on the September breakeven target, the cost reductions we have executed will continue to flow to the P&L over the remainder of the year. But the timing of the HELOC partnership ramps and launches and the pace of the refinance market will determine when we cross over. Rather than re-anchor to a specific month, we will report our progress each quarter and let the results speak for themselves. On the balance sheet, we ended Q2 2026 with approximately $102 million in cash and cash equivalents and $10 million in restricted cash. We believe the balance sheet today is appropriately positioned to support our path towards profitability. In addition, our total warehouse capacity stands at approximately $850 million, a 48% increase from year-end 2025. That capacity reflects both the belief in the platform and the infrastructure required to support future partnership growth. Our warehouse lenders have continued to expand their commitments alongside us, which we see as a strong vote of confidence in the direction we're headed. We continue to pursue the sale of our UK bank subsidiary, Birmingham Bank, to a process led by FT Partners. We will provide an update when there is a material development. We'll continue to give you clear visibility into these numbers each quarter and let the results speak for the progress we are making. I'll turn it back to the operator for Q&A.

We will now begin the question and answer session. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. If you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star 1 again. We ask that you pick up your handset when asking a question to allow for optimum sound quality. If you are muted locally, please remember to unmute your device. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Your first question comes from the line of Karthik Mehta with North Coast Research. Your line is open, Karthik. Please go ahead.

Let's start off just looking at third quarter guidance. When looking at the third quarter guidance, it kind of assumes lower loan volume and revenue sequentially. Yet the implied EBITDA performance suggests that you're realizing meaningful benefits from the cost initiatives. And so I was wondering if you could discuss how much of that improvement is already visible versus how much you can realize over the next 12 months.

Hey, Karthik, it's Levine. Thanks for the question. Yeah, so in our Q2, if you adjust for the trade, our OPEX was around $75 million. And the midpoint of our Q3 guidance has OPEX about $67 million. So, say about $8 million of savings from quarter over quarter. We saw the cost cuts later in the quarter, so we couldn't get the impact of the majority of them in 2Q, but we see a meaningful impact in our cost cuts in Q3, which is why, despite lower volumes and lower revenue in Q3, we should get that revenue done.

And Daniel, you talked about, obviously, partnerships. Some of them are delayed. I'm wondering if you could talk about maybe your pipeline of new partnerships, and is it a delay just because it takes time to implement them, or is it a delay because maybe demand is different today than it was six months ago for those partnerships?

Thanks for the question. The answer is that when you deal with large enterprises, you are subject to their rollout schedule, both in terms of the percentages of leads we would get, the actual launch dates, etc. So it's not a lack of demand at all for TinMan. In fact, we've made some announcements about our HELOC product coming to market. I think it's our first partnership from the D2C. So the pipeline is very robust. We've spoken to all the partners this week, and we feel that we're in a great position. But in terms of guiding you for Q3, it becomes difficult. So we decided we weren't going to include the impact of any launches in those numbers. But certainly as we end into the second, I guess, Q4 this year, that's when I think you'll really start to see some activity.

Thanks, it's good to hear. I apologize. Go ahead.

But no, just I think the other thing is, again, leaning into the HELOC side, because right now our enterprise partnerships are very skewed towards the refinancing. So that obviously has the macro headwind. So the ones in the second half of the year, we think are going to start to be more meaningful because they're the right kind of partner and it's the right kind of product, which is our HELOC.

Perfect. Thank you. Good to hear the pipeline is still pretty strong.

Your next question comes from the line of Kyle Peterson with Needham. your line is open kyle please go ahead great uh good afternoon thank you for taking the questions um you know wanted to dig into the the third quarter guide a little bit but um more on the top line base just wanted to see if you guys could help us you know maybe bridge in a little more detail um in terms of kind of how we get from you know the the 2q level to 3q i assume there's a good amount of mix that'll probably be changing there with less refi, more home equity, but any more color that you guys could give in terms of what to expect on the mix and kind of what's and takes to get to the third quarter revenue would be really helpful.

Hey, Kyle, thanks. Yeah, that's a great question. As we said on our first year earnings call, we'll expect the percentage of HELOC in our total volumes to increase, and we saw that in the second quarter. We went from 12% of volumes in the first quarter, HELOCs being 12% of volumes in the first quarter, to being 18% of volumes in the second quarter. We expect HELOCs to be meaningfully higher in the third quarter. We don't want to kind of give exact pinpoint guidance for a couple of reasons. One is we've factored in no HELOC partnerships in R3Q guide, right? It's purely D2C. And the second piece is the macro environment affects the refi business. So that mix is uncertain as well.

Okay. That is helpful. And then, you know, as a follow-up, I hear you on not including, you know, any of the HELOC contribution with partnerships. So, but did want to ask a little bit about what that could look like, you know, in the future, specifically with, with Credit Karma. I guess, how are you guys thinking about how long it would take a partnership like this to get up and running? And, you know, when that could start to contribute, you know, to volumes? Is that, you know, in, in the fourth quarter of this year? Or, you know, is that more of a next year event? Just any, any directional rough timing? on the ramp time there would be great.

So the answer is multiple partnerships should start to kick in in HELOC in the fourth quarter. So far this quarter, we have done no partner launches and no HELOC launches specifically. So hopefully that gives you a sense of why the bridge on revenue. We are basically still have the refi environment in our largest enterprise segment, and we don't have anything really additional in terms of channel development in the HELOC product.

Thank you. your next question comes from the line of joseph vafi with canaccord genuity your line is open joseph please go ahead hey guys uh good afternoon um welcome on board daniel uh the maybe can we talk a little bit about ramping heloc volume um you know it sounds like it's going to continue to ramp here on a makeshift basis into Q3, but it doesn't sound like we're necessarily signing any new partners right now. So we're going to just double click on where HELOC volume growth is coming from in a more detailed way across your existing channels. Is it direct B2C or or is there a channel benefit here? Thanks.

I think just to correct that point, we have signed HELOC partnerships. They just haven't launched or ramped yet. So that's why I'm pushing you towards the fourth quarter when you start to see some impact. And the HELOC product itself, we have a very competitive offering vis-a-vis our competition. Tin Man is a great solution for HELOC, as is our loan operation. So again, I think we're really excited about the HELOC partnership, But we want to be thoughtful about Q3 Guide just because we're not in control of those start dates. We know that they're coming, but they're not coming in this quarter.

Okay, that's helpful. And then are there any channels that you think, you know, maybe better is going to de-emphasize moving forward relative to previously? Thanks very much.

I think that echoes my comments on focus. There's the kind of partnership we want and the one that we really don't think makes a ton of sense for the business right now. When you're thinking about ripping out existing systems and training other people's loan officers on the use of Tin Man, those are very long sales cycle. They're very expensive in terms of customer support. It's the partnerships where we are using our API-driven culture to plug in Tin Man. we can provide a white label solution and that includes the wholesale channel which i think is going to be starting towards the end of september and it includes the enterprise platform the platforms that we have so there's a wide market that covers most of the tam of the industry particularly in heloc but it's the really complicated enterprise integrations that we think so far have not yielded material results and the cost associated with them has been high Great.

Thanks. And then maybe just if I could sneak one more, can you just give us an update on your pricing strategy in the market? I know, you know, when Tin Man launched, it was a little disruptive. You know, an update on the outlook there would be helpful. Thank you very much.

Yeah, absolutely. We're going to price to keep our price. Our pricing methodology is more on contribution margin.

We're going to keep our pricing methodology around the 20 to 25 percent. incremental contribution margin across all channels and products i think the way we want you all to start thinking about the company is less about loan volume because of the change and mix of heloc versus first lien and we want you to think less about simply revenue growth but look at contribution margin which is less our marketing expense or the loan platform fees we have to pay that's a proper metric rather than seeing if we're buying business in the marketing dtc channel great thank you very much as a reminder if you would like to ask a question please press star

one to raise your hand the next question comes from the line of ramsey el asal with canter fitzgerald your line is open ramsey please go ahead hi thank you very much for taking my question this evening um daniel congratulations on the new role uh i guess my first question is why now on the CEO transition why did the board decide to act now and then maybe I'll as a two-parter here also you were listed as interim CEO but your prepared remarks sounded more permanent and I was just wondering if the board's running a search for a permanent CEO or whether the interim title is I don't know it's self interim if that makes sense the board is committed to running a search

for a full-time CEO and part of my service on the board of directors of stepping into this role is giving them the most flexibility that they need. They've also given me the total authority to act against a strategic plan, which is why I probably sound less interim today. So we have a strategic plan, we're acting, and we have a search firm. In terms of the decision of why now, I think the board concluded that we are really in a transitional phase between a founder mode-based company, which is creativity and many different projects, versus an enterprise stage of executing against very select ideas that have a demonstrated product market fit. That's the transition moment. And obviously, Vishal has been an incredible founder for the company, and we are all very grateful.

Fantastic. Let me squeeze one more quick one in. I mean, given your background, is the board exploring any kind of strategic alternatives for the business? Is that on the table or is that not something that's being contemplated?

There's no formal strategic alternatives processed at this time.

Fantastic. Thank you very much.

We have reached the end of the Q&A session. I will now turn the call back to Daniel Lewis for closing remarks.

Thank you all for joining us. I'm grateful to our team for all the hard work. We're focused on executing with discipline and delivering on the opportunity ahead. Look forward to speaking to you all again next quarter.

This concludes today's call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.