Postscript: Were the Harrah's cars really such great deals?

One of the claims we hear most often with the Harrah's sales is that the prices were incredibly cheap by today's standards. Looking at 37 cars that have gone on to sell again at auction, that's not so clear. The median annualized return of these cars is 4 percent. Annual return for the S&P 500 since 1985 is 11.5 percent.

But there's a major caveat: Many of the choicest cars from the Harrah's collection have never appeared again at a public auction.