Back in the good old days — circa January 2018 — the most expensive apartment rent in Manteca was a three-bedroom, two-bathroom unit for $2,345.

It was what a 1,297-square-foot unit was commanding in the Tesoro Apartments on the northwest corner of Atherton Drive and Van Ryn Avenue complex that was starting to lease units.

That was 52 months and $620 ago.

If you want a three-bedroom two-bathroom apartment with 55 less square feet today, you have to be ready to shell out $2,965 at the Atherton Arms on Atherton Drive just east of Bass Pro Shops.

A 440-square-foot studio apartment in Westwood Village on Center Street west of Union Road cost $1,105 to rent back in January 2018. Today that same studio will cost you $1,365 a month.

And if you want a newer and slightly larger studio with 515 square feet at Atherton Arms, it will cost you $1,995 a month.

Manteca and nearby cities such as Tracy, are keeping pace with high rent markets across the United States that saw a 14 percent increase in rents between April 2021 and April 2022. The cities that aren’t keeping pace, ironically, are in the “inner Bay Area” such as San Jose and San Francisco.

While their rent increases were slightly less, they are still commanding on average $1,000 more people month than similar apartments — those that are newer and have more amenities — for their respective markets compared to Manteca.

Manteca, however, is not the roughest market for rent increases by far.

Based on Redfin data, Austin in Texas saw an increase of 40 percent in rental prices in year-to-year companions, New York City was up 35 percent and several metro areas in Florida exceeded 30 percent.

Federal data shows between 2001 and 2018 the income of renters in the United States overall increased 0.5 percent. At the same time rental prices increased 13 percent.

In Manteca, based on annual rent surveys conducted by the Bulletin since 2001, the average rent of major apartment complexes more than doubled.

The bottom line is more than 20.4 million households — nearly half of all renters in the United States — were paying more than a third of their overall income to rent and utility bills such as electricity, natural gas as well as water, sewer and solid waste collection.

Economists contend that the ideal upper limit of household income going toward housing and related costs of shelter is 30 percent in order for people to live comfortably.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com