Be a bit careful and talk to your bank. We bought our new place before selling our old place but we took a calculated risk and even then the bank was a pain to deal with. We had almost $700K worth of equity in the house we were selling and our new place was only $535K so it should have been a no-brainer. On top of that, we were both earning good money. So we thought we would be home and hosed especially as the suburb we were living in had a 100% clearance rate for houses and had for the previous 12 months.

EVEN SO ... the bank was an absolute pain and refused to give us a bridging loan. Instead, we had to take out an investment loan on the new place. No idea of the logic behind that but that's why I'm telling you to talk to your bank first.

Also, explain the situation to the real estate agent. They would deal with this situation a lot and would have some ideas on what you could do in your situation with regard to contracts.