The trustees don't allow the reserve to be shown. Nothing to do with auction.com. They go by the instructions the trustee sends them.

The low price attracts bidders like flies to poop. That being said a more ethical business practice I maintain would yield better results. Unethical practices limits their profit potential.

If you read the terms of auction they can bid you up
They do this as normal business. The same property can be auctioned many times I call it fishing they are testing the price market for banks if ya don't know the reserve price they can simply say reserve was never meet than after several auctions it will sell for less than what ya bid to someone else happened to me.

Scams rarely make sense, that's why they're scams. I can't believe that auction.com is even legal.

They are really using the term auction loosely. Basically you will need to bid past what they want for the property to be accepted.

They want you to get into a bidding war to increase the sales price. They can also bid to drive up the sales price. You may be the only actual bidder, but the website will show that there are other bidders involved. This company is a scam and I would strongly recommend staying away from them and going to a more legitimate auction site. I have bought and sold many houses over the years and I have never had an auction company bid against me on a property.

This attracts more buyers and lures them to bid but they indicate you when the reserve met