NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - With rates at all-time lows, mortgage payments are accounting for a higher percentage of borrowers' income than ever, and a published report Wednesday said soaring home prices should keep that trend going.

Mortgage payments made up 6.37 percent of American households' disposable income in the fourth quarter of 2001, the latest data available, reaching the highest level since the Federal Reserve began tracking such data in 1980. During that time, the mortgage bite has climbed 45 percent.

And a report in the Wall Street Journal Wednesday said that the mortgage burden should only grow larger, since so many people are investing in homes and trying to cash in on low mortgagerates, while the cost of homes continues to rise.

Other incentives have encouraged the home-buying and borrowing boom, including lenders requiring less cash for downpayments -- the average has hit 3 percent, versus 10 percent a decade ago -- as well as banks allowing some borrowers to apply for mortgages amounting to up to 50 percent of their income, according to the Journal.

Such flexibility helps borrowers qualify to buy homes that previously would have been out of their price range, so they end up putting a higher percentage of their paychecks into their mortgages.

Many conservative financial planners advise borrowers to put no more than 30 percent of income toward a mortgage, the report said.