Just out of curiosity, why should it be that if a house is going to be “secured,” even if it has been legitimately foreclosed upon, for the sake of argument, that all the possessions should be destroyed or irretrievably disposed of? There could be plenty of value in the possessions, e.g. antiques, and they are simply not the bank’s property.
That’s the question I have. Even if the bank honestly thought that the house was to be foreclosed upon, the possessions would then be auctioned off to help pay off what might be still owed on the mortgage.
It takes time to put things up for auctions, because you have to catalogued everything, unless you sell it en masse, but even that takes time.
The stuff should have been secured.
The only thing I can think of is that whoever emptied the house might have bought it off the bank unseen, with the expectation of selling the possessions in part would allow for a profit.