MIAMI NICE:
A FLORIDA FAMILY FINDS PARADISE IN MANHATTAN BEACH HOME WRITTEN BY: PAMELA CORANTE-HANSEN
Florida stock trader David Leshner admits he was always curious about the West Coast. So last summer after construction
was completed on his new custom home in Miami, he and his family packed their bags and headed to Southern California for some beachside R&R. All it took was two weeks in a Manhattan Beach Strand rental to inspire a radical, life-altering decision. "I told [my wife] Deanna, 'We're going back to Miami and putting the house up for sale,'" Leshner recalls. Their short stay
in Manhattan Beach was enough to make the family want to relocate – and start the house-hunting process all over again. "I promised her we'd be in Manhattan Beach within a year." And so began several months of cross-country flights — sometimes twice in the same week — to find the perfect Manhattan Beach home. The Lesnhers faced the same dilemma some would-be Manhattan Beach home buyers encounter even today: Homes were listed, but sold in a matter of minutes. Right about the time the Leshners were searching for a house, builder Matt Morris of Matt Morris Development was in the
midst of constructing a custom home for a couple who had a property in another state. "One day they left for their other home, and they never came back," Morris recounts. In a textbook case of serendipity, Leshner and his wife happened upon the Morris home while it was being built. The British West Indies plantation-style house resembled an architectural theme popular in Miami and other parts of Florida. "My
12.16.2011 | SOUTHBAYDIGS.COM 93
PHOTOGRAPHY BY PAUL JONASON
