Canada’s federal housing agency is warning it now sees signs that Vancouver’s housing market is becoming too frothy.

Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. said it had flagged “moderate evidence of problematic conditions” in Vancouver’s housing market thanks to soaring prices that have far outstripped underlying economic fundamentals in the region.

“Single-detached home prices are now observed to be at levels higher than those consistent with financial, economic and demographic fundamentals,” CMHC wrote in a new report assessing the state of the country’s housing market in the second quarter of this year. “Inventories of new and resale homes have been declining while demand has remained strong. These factors, in combination, are putting sustained upward pressure on prices.”

It is the first time that CMHC has issued a warning about conditions in Vancouver’s scorching-hot housing market, even as prices for single-family homes have steadily climbed out of reach of most local first-time buyers and have jumped nearly 50 per cent in the past three years.

Home resales in the country’s most expensive housing market hit an all-time record in March, the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver said, soaring 56 per cent above the 10-year average. The benchmark price of a detached home rose more than 27 per cent compared to a year earlier, and surged nearly 40 per cent in some parts of the region.

With the addition of Vancouver, the federal housing agency highlighted problems in about 10 out of the 15 largest local housing markets in the country. However, it said despite concerns about inflated home prices and high levels of new-home construction, it continued to see scant evidence that the national housing market is headed for a correction.

CMCH reiterated its previous concerns about housing markets in Toronto, Calgary, Regina and Saskatoon, where it said it found “strong evidence” of problems in the market. In Calgary and Saskatchewan it warned that job losses combined with rising vacancy rates pointed to an oversupply of housing on the market.

In Toronto, CMHC pointed to rising prices and the growing price gap between condos and single-family homes. “The continued rise in house prices has not been matched by growth in personal disposable income and population giving rise to strong evidence of overvaluation,” the agency wrote. The price gap has been exacerbated by a lack of new detached home construction and what CMHC said were “concerns about the high inventory of completed and unsold condominium apartments.”

CMHC also said it found “moderate evidence” of problems in the housing markets in Edmonton, Ottawa, Montreal, and Quebec City.