Households lifted their level of home loan repayments over the course of 2011, so that by the end of the year they were paying, in aggregate, twice as much back on their loans as required by the terms of their loan.As a result, last year those with a mortgage succeeded, on average, in injecting the equivalent of three per cent of their annual income into their home as equity.These findings, published in the Reserve Bank of Australia's half-yearly Financial Stability Review, highlight the continuing post-GFC trend among that proportion of the population with consumer debts to pay down those debts much more quickly than was the case before the global financial crisis.This data also puts a different light on estimates of the extent of "negative equity" in the housing stock that (due to a lack of data) rely only on price trends in housing.In the Financial Stability Review, the RBA estimated that the level of excess repayments by borrowers with home loans was "roughly the same as required repayments in the December quarter 2011."The RBA said this was up from an excess equal to about 80 per cent of required repayments in the March 2011 quarter. One factor lifting this ratio is the reduction in home-loan interest rates in late 2011 and the relatively static level of loan repayments on the part of borrowers, even where their lender will allow a lower payment.Partly as a result of these repayment trends, the RBA said it estimated the rate of housing equity injection since 2008 to be around three per cent of disposable income annually since 2008. In the middle of the 2000s the RBA estimated the level of average annual equity withdrawal at four per cent of disposable income.Drawing on data from the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia survey, the HILDA survey, the RBA noted that almost one quarter of indebted households made principal repayments of A$25,000 or more in 2010. This was close to twice the percentage of households that made repayments of this level earlier in the decade.There was a small fall in the percentage of households that took out (via redraws or refinancing) $25,000 or more.These trends also help explain a decline in the level of loans past due. The RBA said the arrears rate on housing loans for banks in Australia fell to 0.6 per cent at the end of December 2011 down from 0.7 per cent in the middle of 2011.This data thus paints a more benign picture of financial stress in the household sector than does the data compiled by credit rating agencies; and it covers the whole of the banking system and 92 per cent of all housing lending. The quarterly commentary on this topic produced by Fitch Ratings this week showed a rise in arrears, for example.Drawing once more on data from the HILDA survey, the RBA tackled the popular debate - popular, that is, among metropolitan media outlets and select financial blogs - over the consequences of the debt-servicing burden