RALEIGH - It was one of the most emphatic, if not controversial, projects proposed in this booming region: 43 stories of glass and steel poised to rise next to a squat, suburban mall.

But for now, Soleil Center is stalled.

Construction on the ambitious hotel-condominium tower near Crabtree Valley Mall has been halted as the developer, Soleil Group, scrambles to get financing in an unforgiving lending environment.

Soleil principals Sanjay Mundra and Dicky Walia forged ahead three years ago despite criticism that the tower's design was out of character with the neighborhood and that its million-dollar prices weren't economically feasible.

In a statement, they said that "due to the current turmoil in the financial markets" they will try to restructure financing for the project.

Attempts to reach them were unsuccessful. But their statement said they have received several proposals from lenders.

Mundra and Walia expect it will take at least three months to close on new financing for the tower, which is to include about 54 sky-high luxury condominiums atop a 290-room Westin Hotel at U.S. 70 and Creedmoor Road.

Caught in the delays are prospective condominium buyers, who are crucial to financing and to Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, which expected to plant its Westin flag there.

There's a residual effect on Raleigh, too. The hotel would add cachet to the region's lodging stock, which helps recruiters attract conventions and events such at the NHL All-Star game, said Loren Gold, executive vice president of the Greater Raleigh Convention and Visitors Bureau.

"We want them as part of the hotel community, and we want it to be a successful project," Gold said. " Will it be a big blow to us? I don't think so."

Competitors scoffed

Mundra and Walia's project faced a thicket of political hurdles and critics -- competing developers dubbed it "Cirque du Soleil Center" -- until it was approved in late 2005.

Now it has higher hurdles.

In recent years as the economy boomed, lenders happily financed about 80 percent of such commercial construction projects. They were particularly willing to gamble on hotels that included condos as personal travel soared and low mortgage rates made it easier for people to buy homes.

Now, discouraged by sluggish home sales and decreasing travel nationwide, financiers are asking developers to sell more condos on the front end and cover almost half the equity -- even in relatively healthy markets -- to reduce risk.

"On big projects, hotel financing has gotten progressively worse," said Raleigh hotel developer Bob Winston. "We don't know where the bottom is or when we'll see it."

The situation has snarled scores of projects in the Triangle, including three similar towers in downtown Raleigh.

None of those developers is in as deep as Soleil.

In December 2003, Mundra and Walia, under an entity called Glen-Tree Investments LLC, paid $5.7 million for the 4.9-acre site where a 30-year-old Sheraton stood.

The partners enlisted architects, paid to demolish the Sheraton, and spent many months and millions of dollars drilling into the earth, making way for 130 concrete foundation caissons to support the tower.

The project, which at one point was to open in April 2009, would take at least two years to build.

Mundra said in an April interview that almost half of the tower's condos were under contract and that his company had cobbled enough construction cash from more than half a dozen lenders. He said at the time that he expected construction to begin within 45 days.

Almost 90 days later, however, nothing has sprouted. And in recent weeks, activity at the construction site stopped.

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