Google is buying a prestigious, 2.9-million-square-foot building at New York's 111 Eighth Avenue, the Wall Street Journal reports.

The building covers an entire city block, between 15th and 16th Streets from Eighth to Ninth Avenues. It once housed the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, and it's currently home to Google's 550,000-square-foot office, as well as data center operations for companies such as Telx.

According to the WSJ, the price of $1.9 billion makes this the largest real estate deal for a single building in the U.S. this year.

The deal has not been closed yet, but it will probably go through as Google has made a large down payment, say sources familiar with the matter.

The building has been on the market only twice before: In 1998, it was sold to Taconic for less than $300 million. Later in 2004, it was revalued at around $800 million when Jamestown acquired a large part of the ownership.

[via WSJ]

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