[nmfisher]

That's not a contractual mistake though, is it?

It was an auction, meaning anyone could bid, and he put a genuine bid for $200k. Just because the system crashed doesn't mean anyone actually made a representation they didn't intend to.

A more realistic example would be the wrong house getting listed for auction due to clerical error (but one still owned by the bank). I'm fairly sure that would be set aside.

[throwaway_kufu]

Edit: sorry you were talking about my example and not the domain.

Auctions are contracts, in this case the seller (bank) agrees to accept the highest offer at the end of the expiration of the auction. So the terms are of the auction are time limited, historically the foreclosure auctions were done in person (sometimes on the courthouse steps), I’ve been at in person foreclosure auctions and the bank had a representative that ended up buying most of them (at least at the ones I attended)

[viceroyalbean]

The second example sounds a bit like the citi debt thing where they accidentally paid the entire principal when they meant only to pay a part.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/02/citibank-just-go...

Maybe I'm stretching it a bit, but the element of reasonably assuming that it was intentional seems similar. I'm sure there are some differentiating intricacies in the law though.