Lead Legal Counsel, Lending Partnerships
Summary of Relevant Experience
Summary of Experience – Lead Legal Counsel, Lending Partnerships @ Upstart
- JD/MBA-credentialed in-house counsel with approximately four years of progressively senior legal experience spanning ERISA, employee benefits, HIPAA, healthcare compliance, and employment law across multiemployer funds and a Fortune 500 insurer.
- Transactional and commercial legal contributor who has led M&A due diligence, plan governance structuring, and complex regulatory compliance programs, reporting directly to C-suite executives and coordinating outside counsel in regulated financial services and healthcare environments.
- Litigation and contracts attorney who has served as lead counsel on complex matters, drafting and negotiating agreements, managing multi-stakeholder negotiations, and building compliance frameworks within heavily regulated industries.
- Cross-functional legal operator with demonstrated ability to translate complex regulatory risk into actionable guidance for non-lawyer business partners, supporting operational scale in financial services and healthcare settings.
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Why this is a fit
Your ERISA/employee benefits/HIPAA legal background is substantively misaligned with this role's core requirements—complex B2B SaaS, loan sale, and capital markets transactional work in a fintech lending context—and the 7-10+ years of transactional/commercial law firm experience required exceeds your approximately four years of in-house experience; the fintech industry and remote-US location are target matches, but the function mismatch is significant.
About the role
About Upstart At Upstart, we’re united by a mission that matters: to radically reduce the cost and complexity of borrowing for all Americans. Every day, we bring creativity, experimentation, and advanced AI to reshape access to credit, helping millions move forward financially with clarity and confidence. As the leading AI lending marketplace, we partner with banks and credit unions to expand access to affordable credit through technology that’s both radically intelligent and deeply human. Our platform runs over one million predictions per borrower using more than 1,800 signals, powering smarter, fairer decisions for millions of customers. But the numbers only hint at the impact. Every idea, every voice, and every contribution moves us closer to a world where credit never stands between people and their financial progress. We’re proudly digital-first, giving most Upstarters the flexibility to do their best work from wherever they thrive, alongside teammates across 80+ cities in the US and Canada. Digital-first doesn’t mean distant. We’re intentional about in-person connection through team onsites, planning sessions, and moments that spark creativity and trust. And whether you choose to work primarily from home or collaborate in-person from one of our offices in Columbus, Austin, the Bay Area, or New York City (opening Summer 2026), you’ll have the support to work in the way that works best for you. If you’re energized by tackling meaningful problems, excited to innovate with purpose, and motivated by work that truly matters, we’d love to hear from you. The Team As a Lead Legal Counsel, Lending Partnerships at Upstart, you’ll be joining a close-knit, collaborative team of attorneys who work in a fast-paced innovative environment. You will act as a key point person for our Lending Partnerships business, while also handling a broad range of commercial, business development, and transactional legal matters across the entire organization. This position is unique because it offers exposure to new legal issues and the opportunity to work on diverse tasks such as contract drafting and negotiation and a number of projects that will arise as we continue to scale. Experience drafting and negotiating complex B2B SaaS agreements is required. Experience drafting and negotiating commercial agreements involving financial services and/or technology licenses in a heavily regulated environment is a big plus. If you have the confidence, creativity, and flexibility to tackle ambiguity and craft innovative legal arrangements with a bias towards action, this could be the right opportunity for you. How you’ll make an impact: Build a deep understanding of our Lending Partnerships (LP) business and collaborate effectively with internal clients to understand and support their goals; Act as a key member of our LP commercial team to provide legal and strategic advice to assess and mitigate legal risks while driving business growth; Review, draft, and negotiate a wide variety of commercial agreements, including purchase agreements, loan sale agreements, servicing agreements, master services agreements, software licenses, SOWs, and other agreements; Engage with numerous internal stakeholders to escalate and resolve issues quickly and efficiently during negotiations; and Develop processes and templates for commercial transactions to support and drive rapidly growing business. What we’re looking for: Minimum Requirements: J.D. degree with solid academic credentials and a state bar membership (NY or CA preferred); 7+ years of experience at a law firm in a transactional practice area (ideally technology transactions, capital markets, or similar) or some combination of in-house/law firm experience with a focus on transactional/commercial matters; Demonstrated ability to act as legal point during intense/complex negotiations and to work effectively with sales leadership to manage expectations and goals; Experience reviewing, drafti