2900.0 - Census of Population and Housing: Understanding the Census and Census Data, Australia , 2016  
ARCHIVED ISSUE Released at 11:30 AM (CANBERRA TIME) 08/11/2017  First Issue
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Mortgage Repayments (monthly) Dollar Values (MRED and MRERD)

These variables record the mortgage repayments being paid by a household to purchase the dwelling in which they were enumerated on Census night (also applicable to caravans). This data item is applicable to occupied private dwellings being purchased, which represents 32.4% of all occupied private dwellings enumerated in the 2016 Census.

How this variable is created

Data for this variable is derived from the Tenure Type and Housing Costs questions. Images of these questions are provided below. Household repayments data is automatically captured from numeric text responses.

Variable history

The question relating to Mortgage Repayments (monthly) Dollar Values was first asked for the 1976 Census, though in some previous years this variable has been referred to as 'Housing Loan Repayments (monthly)'.
Since 2011, Nil repayments is recorded as $0 in Mortgage Repayments (monthly) Dollar Values and as a separate category called 'Nil repayments' in Mortgage Repayments (monthly) Ranges. Prior to 2011 a response of nil was coded as 'Not Stated'.

Non-response rate

Item non-response rates are a measure of how many people did not respond to a particular question as a proportion of the total number of people the question was applicable to. In this instance the response is left as not stated.

The majority of item non-response is attributable to the people who did not respond to the Census at all. Refer to item non-response rates for more information. The second and smaller contributor to item non-response is when people return a Census form but may not answer a particular question(s). For more information, refer to Understanding Census data quality.

The non-response rate for this variable was 4.2% (5.3% in 2011).

Data usage notes


Processing Mortgage Repayments (monthly) Dollar Values is subject to some recognition error, particularly when responses incorrectly include cents and the decimal point is missing or unclear. All responses ending in '00' were checked for recognition error, as were other unlikely values. Some high or low values when combined with income may form unlikely combinations. While the data is subject to normal sample checks to ensure an acceptable level of quality, numeric responses are accepted as reported by the respondents on the form.

Further information

A definition of Mortgage Repayments (monthly) Dollar Values is available in the 2016 Census Dictionary with additional information available in the Glossary.

Ranged data is available from the variable Mortgage Repayments (monthly) ranges.

Household form question image

Questions 56 and 58 as they appeared on the 2016 Census Household Form

2016 Household Paper Form - Question 56. Is this dwelling:
2016 Household Paper Form - Question 58. How much does your household pay for this dwelling?
A text only version of the online Census Household form is available from the Downloads tab.