Planet Financial Group was able to achieve its annual growth rates of 58% in its originations business and 21% in its servicing portfolio organically.
The company,
"To grow, you've got to manage your risk," Dubeck said. "We greatly grew our servicing book, and that is a testament to our MSR risk strategy, which is comprised of retention, and our hedging strategy."
This worked to preserve the mortgage servicing rights value, something Planet pays daily attention to and is actively managed.
"We have a saying here at Planet that retention is religion, we've had that from day one," Dubeck said. "The signs were on the wall [starting in] late Q2 that higher for longer could be coming to an end," referring to the mortgage rate environment.
Planet made moves to step up its retention operations.
Planet funded approximately $28.6 billion in total originations and while $24.6 billion of which came through the correspondent channel (up about 58%), the retail retention business had a 52% increase in volume over 2024 to $2.5 billion. Distributed retail did 65% more volume year-over-year to $1.4 billion.
Fourth quarter volume of approximately $8.4 billion was
Planet services its own book of business and the unit has a 95% net promoter score. This "makes the work of the retention group all that much more easier when they're handed a happy borrower," Dubeck said.
The company had a total servicing portfolio of $144.8 billion at year end, up from $140.9 billion on Sept. 30, 2025. Its owned MSRs grew to $138.5 billion, which also included MSR acquisitions in addition to the volume growth and retention activity. The company generated servicing assets of $11.4 billion through co-issue and bulk purchases last year.
When it comes to distributed retail, the company grew its branch network, with new leadership joining the channel, helping with recruiting efforts, increasing staffing about 30%.
"That's been something that we've really invested in over the last three years," Dubeck said. "You really have to build a business like that in the down market, and I think we've just really created a terrific value proposition for loan officers not only to exceed but to really grow their business."
This year will be a strong environment for Planet's direct lending business, its retention and branch network channels, he said. "The retail seeds we have planted with, the hires we've done, are just going to grow and grow."
Retention is a function of interest rates, and while those did move higher this past week because of the Iran conflict, people are not talking about how much the mortgage-to-Treasury spread has tightened in recent weeks, Dubeck said.
A prepayment speed report from Keefe Bruyette & Woods agreed. The primary and secondary spreads have narrowed against
This contraction suggests "lenders may be absorbing some of the rate pressure and hoping the current rise in rates and spreads proves temporary," said George. "While seasonal tailwinds could continue to support prepayment speeds trending higher, a persistent move up in rates would likely slow refinance activity and put some downward pressure on speeds going forward."
George calculated that 12% of the outstanding mortgage market is in the money to refinance. If rates fell 100 basis points from current levels, this would grow to 29%.
Meanwhile also feeding into the positive outlook at Planet is an increase of about 20% in the number of homes for sale.
"Look, we're very positive about 2026 from how we're positioned," Dubeck said. "I think we've got some, question marks with the broader environment," pointing to the headlines about some participants in the private credit sector.
Still, "as long as we kind of stay in this environment or better, I think we're going to be very successful," he continued.
