Short answer
A mortgage banker is a company that funds home loans with its own or warehouse capital, closes them in its own name, and then sells them on the secondary market or keeps them to service. Despite the name, a mortgage banker is not a bank: it is a non-depository lender licensed by state mortgage regulators through NMLS, with higher net worth and bond requirements than a broker because it carries the funding risk.
The mortgage banker model sits between the broker and the depository bank. Like a broker, it originates loans through licensed loan originators; unlike a broker, it underwrites to its own guidelines and funds at closing, typically drawing on a warehouse line of credit that is repaid when the loan is sold. Revenue comes from origination fees, gain on sale, and servicing income for loans it retains.
Licensing follows the funding risk: mortgage lender licenses carry meaningfully higher net worth minimums than broker licenses, larger surety bonds, and commonly audited or reviewed financial statements. Individual originators at a mortgage banker hold the same MLO licenses as anywhere else. The side-by-side with the broker model is at /compare/mortgage-broker-vs-mortgage-banker, and the company licensing stack is covered at /mortgage-lender-broker-licensing.
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