Google: 'everyone's favorite garage band' buys its start-up garage

Google has bought itself a birthday present for its 8th birthday (see “Google: Happy Birthday to us!"): the 1,900-square-foot  Menlo Park house that boasts the garage where Sergey Brin and Larry Page launched Google eight years ago. According to AP reports, Google purchased the property:

from one of its own employees, Susan Wojcicki, who had agreed to lease her garage for $1,700 per month because she wanted some help paying the mortgage.Wojcicki, now Google's vice president of product management, didn't work for the company at the time and only knew the Stanford University graduate students because one of her friends had dated Brin.

During Google's five-month history there, the garage became like a second home for Page and Brin.

Google’s official version of “ Everyone's favorite garage band,” and the garage’s owner:

In September 1998, Google Inc. opened its door in Menlo Park, California. The door came with a remote control, as it was attached to the garage of a friend who sublet space to the new corporation's staff of three. The office offered several big advantages, including a washer and dryer and a hot tub. It also provided a parking space for the first employee hired by the new company…

In 1998, Susan's garage served as the company's first headquarters. When she joined the young company in 1999, Susan was the small staff's first marketing professional.

Google has not disclosed the price it paid for the property, its location or what Google specifically aims to do with it:

We plan to preserve the property as a part of our living legacy, said Google spokesman Jon Murchinson.