The package includes the Wells Fargo Center at 400 Capitol Mall in Downtown, suburban office buildings in the area's Campus Commons, Point West, South Natomas and Watt submarkets, and nine buildings in the Roseville/Rocklin area, according to the sources. The deal does not include a few EOP properties in the Folsom area that were sold to a joint venture of McCarthy, Cook & Co. and J.P. Morgan, they say.

Jason Goff and Drew Petersen with Jones Lang LaSalle in Sacramento assisted Eastdil Secured, the firm Blackstone Group retained to market the portfolio. John Frisch, head of the Sacramento office of Cornish & Carey, also assisted in the transaction. Goff tells GlobeSt.com that "every one of buildings is the best real estate in historically the best markets in Sacramento." Frisch tells GlobeSt.com the properties are "garnering higher rents and higher occupancy levels" than the market average.

"We have 14 percent to 15 percent vacancy rates but if you look at the buildings they bought, I'll bet the vacancy is between 2 percent and 10 percent," Frisch says. "Vacancy is actually going up here because we've had a tremendous amount of new construction -- 10 million sf in the last four years -- but approximately 75% of the total is small buildings aimed at the owner-user market, which offers less competition (to the EOP portfolio), so the vacancy numbers are deceptive."

Exactly how Hines is divvying up the Sacramento portfolio among its myriad entities has not yet been fully disclosed. More than half of the package, approximately 1.4 million sf, is being acquired by an indirect subsidiary of Hines-Sumisei U.S. Core Office Fund for approximately $490 million, according to a recent SEC filing. Organized by Hines in August 2003, the Core Fund invests in existing office properties in the United States that Hines believes are desirable as long-term holdings.

Shorenstein Properties of San Francisco, which ultimately acquired EOP's 4.2 million-sf Portland portfolio for approximately $1 billion, was one of several bidders for EOP's Sacramento assets.