Netflix's Too Hot To Handle Star Hooking Up With Bachelorette Contestant As Reality TV Worlds Collide

francesca farago too hot to handle netflix jef holm the bachelorette 2012 abc

We all know that looking for love can be difficult, especially right now, so it makes a lot of sense when we see people who have similar experiences get together, even if we never would have pegged them for a potential romance with each other. This is especially true for the relatively small pool of folks who became well-known after starring on reality dating competitions, but now it seems that Too Hot To Handle's Francesca Farago and The Bachelorette's Jef Holm are hooking up, making sure that two reality TV worlds collide.

According to TMZ, Francesca Farago (whom fans first met on Season 1 of Netflix's Too Hot To Handle earlier this year) and Jef Holm (who appeared on Emily Maynard's season of The Bachelorette in 2012) are now dating, even though the couple hasn't taken the extra step to define their relationship just yet. The twosome is said to have met through a friend of Farago's, Australian model Casey Boonstra, about a month ago and quickly hit it off because of their shared senses of humor and (no big shocker here) their time spent on reality dating shows.

Word is that the new couple has been basically inseparable since meeting, are now vacationing together in Utah (which is where Jef is from) with a group of their friends, and are also spending a lot of time living it up on Jef's parents' boat. Honestly, this doesn't sound like a bad way to spend your late summer pandemic times, so good on Francesca and Jef for making a love connection during the enduring weirdness that is 2020.

Famously, Francesca became one of Too Hot To Handle's early stars as she (and her fellow castmates) attempted to forego all sexual activity (yes, even kissing and the, ahem, solo kind of sexytimes) in order to win the big cash prize. But, good ol' Francesca partnered up with Harry Jowsey pretty quickly after meeting, and the couple simply could not keep their hands off of each other's assorted well-toned parts. The duo ended up costing the group a lot of money, earning the ire of several others in the cast, but it was worth it for a time as Francesca and Harry did take their romance away from the show.

Back in April, Francesca and Harry were still booed up, even though lockdown meant that they couldn't see each other in person with her living in Vancouver and him making his home in Los Angeles, but they were making noises about marriage at the time. Unfortunately, it would seem that the distance did get to the couple, and Harry broke things off with Francesca in mid-June. But, it looks like she may have found love again with Jef.

As those in Bachelor Nation may remember, Jef Holm wasn't just a contestant on Season 8 of The Bachelorette, but he was also the eventual "winner," whose proposal lead Emily Maynard accepted at the end of the season. But, like many Bachelor franchise stars who end up engaged by the finale, Jef and Emily ended things a few months later, making their breakup official in mid-October of the same year.

While Francesca has certainly been making the rounds lately and managed to stay in the public eye recently, Jef pretty much disappeared after he and Emily announced their breakup. It's usually quite common for people who've been on one Bachelor show or another to at least pop up every now and then for interviews / appearances within the franchise, but Jef seems to be quite happy not being a public person, which makes his new found time with Francesca all the more intriguing.

Apparently, Francesca will be heading back to Canada soon to visit family for a while, so she and Jef will see if their new romance can survive the distance before long. For more on this and everything else TV and movies, be sure to stay tuned to CinemaBlend for the latest!

Adrienne Jones
Senior Content Creator

Covering The Witcher, Outlander, Virgin River, Sweet Magnolias and a slew of other streaming shows, Adrienne Jones is a Senior Content Producer at CinemaBlend, and started in the fall of 2015. In addition to writing and editing stories on a variety of different topics, she also spends her work days trying to find new ways to write about the many romantic entanglements that fictional characters find themselves in on TV shows. She graduated from Mizzou with a degree in Photojournalism.