I say no, there may be some exceptions but for almost all courthouse step auctions by banks (trustees), it is merely a legal step required to take the house back, it has to be offered for the amount of the debt. When the court is liquidating assets that are seized for another reason, there can be a highest bidder scenario but that would be stated in the public notice that you can find online from the newspaper website. The fine print will say something to the effect of the highest bidder as opposed to a specific dollar amount which in todays market is always more than the place is worth.
The other drawback is that nobody has been inside at the point of a courthouse step auction, in some cases the occupant is still there and will need to be evicted. The bank doesn’t get to inspect until after the auction date, nor do you. It’s one thing buying an REO and entirely another buying an unseen property. Just ignore that stage. If it was worth the same or more than the auction amount, it would have already been sold by the FB who lived there. The auction amount is also only for the first, the second and other lienholders have not yet released, after the auction, they are wiped out and you can do a traditional escrow and have title insurance, not so with a step auction.
