BIS Review 17/2003  9  The upward trend in debt servicing is clearer in the lower line in the graph, which shows the debt servicing requirement specifically for housing debt. Currently, about 6 per cent of household disposable income is devoted to servicing the interest cost of mortgages.
This is higher by about 1 percentage point than the peak value in 1990, despite the much lower level of mortgage interest rates, because the size of mortgage debt outstanding is now so much higher.