Solidere was founded after the government chose the framework of the public-private Real Estate Holding Company (REHCO) as the most viable option to reconstruct the central district, which was severely damaged and demolished, and emptied of its pre-war economic and demographic activity. Some research points out that the REHCO solution was the only viable option. The practical nonexistence of a functional government after the war, and the near-impossibility to align all stakeholders, including property owners, into one unified and feasible vision, called for private resources to plan and execute a project of such scale and importance. Hariri's credibility as a business person and the speed and efficiency of submitting plans and investments models all played in favor of the REHCO model. It can be argued that without this large-scale intervention, the centre would have at best re-developed in a chaotic and uncoordinated manner, the way that other areas of the capital are experiencing.