The 18-year-old, named only as Michael, listed semi-clothed images of his 44-year-old mother Jennifer on the TradeMe website under the title "3 glamour shots of my mum".

He has placed a reserve price of $5 on the photos - but his expectations appear to have been wildly exceeded. So far the photographs have attracted a bid of $10.50.

Michael first auctioned "five naked photos of my mum'' to annoy her after the pair had an argument, he told the Herald on Sunday newspaper.

When TradeMe removed the listing the following day he relisted a second series of "glamour photos'' with her permission.

This time there was more clothing but one was an underwear shot.

Jennifer said she was "pretty annoyed'' by the first listing, calling her son a "cheeky little git", but liked the second lot because they were "quite artistic''.

"There's nothing dodgy about them. They were taken by a family friend about eight years ago,'' Jennifer told the newspaper.

"I wanted 50 per cent of the sale but more than that, I miss the nice comments.''

The original photos were viewed 11,000 times before they were pulled by the website's management, citing "inappropriateness''.

"We don't really want to be the place where people list photos of their mums in their underwear,'' TradeMe spokesman Jon Macdonald said.