Bank vs mortgage broker vs online lender why do the numbers vary so much?

When people say “shop around,” most advice stops there.

What surprised me when I went through it is that comparing multiple lenders of the same type three banks, for example usually produced very similar results. The bigger differences showed up when I compared different lender types side by side banks, large mortgage companies, credit unions, and brokers.

Within categories, pricing clustered tightly. Across categories, it didn’t. For those who’ve closed recently did lender type materially affect your rate and fees, or did execution and responsiveness matter more?