In fact, mortgage servicing is where lenders make the real money. The entire system of originating mortgages, including wholesale lenders, mortgage brokers and mortgage bankers is designed so that servicers get loans into their portfolio -- hopefully at a "break even" level -- but often at a loss. Mortgage servicing is where they make their profit.
Once your loan has been packaged into a pool and sold to Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, or Ginnie Mae, the lender gets additional funds so they can make more loans (to service in their portfolio) and sell to those institutions, so they can get more money, and so on....
This is the cycle that allows institutions to lend you money.
