Solan joined the New York City Housing Development Corp. after nearly 19 years with the Illinois Housing Development Authority. He was manager of the authority's multifamily department before becoming assistant director in 1996, a post he held for his last four years there.

The native New Yorker cited family reasons for his decision to return to the community of about 60,000 on Chicago's western border, known as the early home of Ernest Hemingway as well as a section of homes designed by architect Frank Lloyd Wright. Before commuting between Chicago and New York, Solan had served as president of the Oak Park Residence Corp., a unique quasi-public agency that buys, manages and redevelops multifamily properties in the village. Its portfolio now includes approximately 500 units, or about 6% of the 4.5-square-mile village's multifamily stock.

Solan also was chairperson of the Oak Park Housing Authority before joining the agency charged with financing affordable housing in New York's five boroughs. In Oak Park, the village board appoints members of both agencies' boards, who then hire personnel to run the Residence Corp. and housing authority, which administers HUD's Housing Choice Voucher (Section 8) program in the village.