In fact, the money is already there. When state mortgage regulators dismantled the guaranty fund in 1991, they did not reduce license fees. Instead, they actually raised them.

In 1990, the fee for a first-time mortgage broker's license was $150, plus a $10 assessment for the victims fund. The next year, the assessment disappeared, but the base fee went up to $200 -- where it remains today.

When the housing market skyrocketed a few years later, state mortgage regulators were awash in cash.

In August 2000, the fund for which licensing fees are collected had $2.7 million on hand. By August 2007, the balance had soared more than tenfold, to $28.6 million. Today, the fund stands at $24.7 million.

Don Saxon, the outgoing commissioner of the Office of Financial Regulation, needs legislative approval to spend that money. Since he took the job in 2003, he has asked for nearly $4 million to hire new staff members, almost $7 million to give raises to employees, and more than $18 million for computer upgrades, budget records show.

But records show that he has not asked for a penny to reimburse mortgage fraud victims. In the same period, Florida's rate of mortgage fraud has climbed steadily, and has been the worst in the nation for the past two years, according to the Mortgage Asset Research Institute.

Saxon, who did not respond to requests for interviews, is set to leave office Sept. 30. He resigned under pressure after The Miami Herald published a series of reports revealing that his office approved thousands of people for mortgage-broker licenses despite criminal histories.

Beyond the money that pays for salaries and operations, license fees also pay for regulators' travel expenses as they routinely fly across the country for conferences.

Robert Tedcastle, former chief of the OFR's mortgage section, expensed more than $39,000 of travel since July 2003, state records show. Last September, he spent a week at an industry conference in a New Mexico spa famous for "Embrace Yourself Body Wraps" and "Juniper Berry Pedicures."

OFR bureau chief Andrew Grosmaire expensed $31,300 over the same period, including a September 2004 conference for collection agency regulators in Jackson Hole, Wyo.

The agency's deputy commissioner, Owen Hager, expensed more than $23,000. In June 2007, he flew from Tallahassee to Palm Beach for a weeklong convention at The Breakers, a five-star hotel.

In written responses to questions from The Miami Herald, OFR spokeswoman Kathleen Kight said the bulk of the office's travel is for examinations and enforcement actions. She did not explain the specific trips to resorts, other than to say that OFR people routinely attend professional conferences and seminars. "Travel is an integral part of the job performed by the office, " she wrote.

The office did not say why there was no effort by regulators in the past decade to revive the guaranty fund or create other remedies to help scammed consumers recoup their money.

In her prepared statement, Kight said federal legislation signed in August requires that states implement some measure, which could include a guaranty fund. She said the OFR is now reviewing the matter.

'AN OUTRAGE'

State Rep. Scott Randolph, D-Orlando, who has proposed mortgage reform legislation, said the agency should have created a remedy, especially when fraud was exploding.

"To think that we have absolutely nothing in place -- nothing -- to help people who are victims from outright fraud and criminal abuse, it is an outrage, " Randolph said.

Rep. Jennifer Carroll, R-Jacksonville, said she was surprised that the state did not have a recovery program for victims, but said the lack of any such program became a problem only when the fraud rate soared.

"If the housing market didn't go bust, we wouldn't be having this discussion, " said Carroll, chairwoman of the financial institutions committee, who thinks brokers should be insured for fraud.

Lurer, the veteran mortgage broker who tried unsuccessfully to save the victims fund more than a decade ago, said that keeping the program running would have helped alleviate many of the problems today.

"They went against the recommendations of the industry, " he said, and now people are suffering."