PHOENIX-The Muller Co. buys its third office property in the metroplex by outbidding 30 other investors jockeying for the 431,435-sf Pointe Corporate Center complex. The asset, bought with a 55% occupancy, is being repositioned as the Plaza at Squaw Peak.

PHOENIX-Four tenants sign a combined 14,152 sf to take occupancy to 84% in a 292,000-sf office project slowly transitioning to a medical-oriented lineup. The largest new deal is Family Practice Specialists, which will get its keys in November.

MESA, AZ-An El Pollo Loco franchisee gets $1.8 million in cash for a 3,004-sf eatery along South Powers Road by signing a 14-year lease with a 10-year option to secure the transaction. The asset trades at full list price to the highest of three offers.

GILBERT, AZ-The developer of the 22-acre Spectrum Falls will break ground by year's end on 100,000 sf of a 200,000-sf plan primed for buyers and tenants looking to land within a half mile of a new hospital. The first phase will deliver by summer 2005.

PHOENIX-SunState Builders pays about $3.2 million for 10 acres, getting a building site for a franchisee's distribution center and an option on another four acres for another build-to-suit or speculative project.

PHOENIX-The two leases, filling a combined 2,272 sf, go to a software programmer and residential builder. The largest space taker gets a spot in Shea Corporate & Medical Center in deal-making delivering one month free rent and $1 per sf bumps per year.

PHOENIX-A Scottsdale investment group lays down $8.3 million for a 47,286-sf medical office building in a sale/leaseback deal to the Arizona Heart Institute. The institute in turn will funnel income from the sale toward construction of two new hospitals in China.

PHOENIX-Starwood Hotels & Resorts grabs the gold with the management pact for a yet-to-be-built Sheraton Phoenix, set to rise beside the city's expanded Civic Plaza Convention Center in Copper Square. The 1,000-room hotel will open in 2008.