Grant Ellis ‘The Bachelor’ season 29. Photo:
Disney/John Fleenor
Grant Ellis’s wish for a wife just might have been granted.
“Without giving away too much, things ended the way they were supposed to end, and I’m happy with it,” The Bachelor, 31, tells PEOPLE. “I’m happy with decisions I made, and I don’t regret anything. I’m very happy with the ending.”
Ellis has his family’s support, too. “They’re happy for me,” he says. “They’re happy for this whole experience, and I think that they’re happy to see me healing from things that happened in my life and doing it in a way where maybe it’ll inspire some people.”
Regardless of whether Ellis walks away from his season with a fiancée, he left with a good friend in host Jesse Palmer.
“He’s cool!” Ellis says. “He’s really present, and he’s invested in the journey as well.”
Bachelor Grant Ellis (left) and host Jesse Palmer. Disney/John Fleenor
Palmer, 46, served as the Bachelor for season 5. Although the ex-NFL star did not tie the knot with his final rose recipient Jessica Bowlin, he’s since married Emely Fardo and welcomed a baby girl named Ella with her in January 2024.
“He was helpful all throughout the journey,” Ellis, a former basketball pro, says of Palmer. “We’re both athletes, we kind of had that lingo down, and we both had the same mindset. And he has his wife and his kids, so I really looked for his advice and his input.”
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After exiting Jenn Tran’s season of The Bachelorette ahead of hometowns, Ellis says he began his own journey in “a really good place” thanks to focusing on work, family and fitness during his time away from reality TV.
“I was ready,” Ellis says. “Really intentional, that’s the word I would use. Being intentional and me healing from Jen’s season was getting back to normal life.”
Bachelor Grant Ellis and Dina. Disney/John Fleenor
Since appearing on 27-year-old Tran’s season, Ellis has been adamant that he wants a wife — and he knows the traits he does and doesn’t want his soulmate to possess.
“For me, a red flag is somebody who’s too self-absorbed,” he says. “I like when somebody’s compassionate and somebody has a heart for other people because that’s the way I am, so I feel like it has to mesh with how I feel. And then hygiene is a big thing for me, too!”
His group of 25 suitors wowed him from the start.
“No entrance rubbed me the wrong way,” Ellis teases of the limo arrivals. “Each one was unique, and all of the women did something that really showed their personality.”
Ellis describes the women as “so great” and says “they put their hearts out there” throughout the season. So when it came to Fantasy Suites, Ellis wanted to use that time to keep getting to know each woman.
“My take on Fantasy Suites was to take things slow and not rush, because I think a lot of times when you initiate the physical part, it could cause you to make really bad decisions,” he says. “So my approach to that [was] to wait, and to see what my connections were like before I engage in anything that would be considered physical, and that really helped me to make good decisions at that point.”
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The Bachelor season 29 premieres Monday, Jan. 27 at 8 p.m. ET on ABC.
