Ali Oetjen says her Bachelor experience has led her to her soulmate

SHE had her heart broken on national TV by Bachelor Tim Robards, but now Ali Oetjen says her failed romance with him led her to the love of her life.

SHE was the vivacious blonde who wore her heart on her sleeve only for it to be broken by Tim Robards on the first season of The Bachelor Australia.

But now Ali Oetjen says her failed romance with Robards has led her to the man she now wants to spend the rest of her life with.

Ever the optimist, the 27-year-old says her heart has mended and she is now head over heels in love with Adelaide man, Dave Waldeck.

Oetjen told news.com.au that she has been dating the thirty-something local for six months and is “very, very happy”.

The Bachelor contestant Ali Oetjen was at times criticised by the other contestants for being too forward with Tim Robards.

“Tim absolutely led me to Dave and he is the most perfect man in the world,” Oetjen said.

“I love him so much and that was my path, The Bachelor was my hurdle and my challenge and something I learnt from and made me more of who I am today and Dave is the one for me.

“I absolutely think everything is meant to be and Dave and I are meant to be. Everything happens for a reason and that’s how we feel. I already know I want to be with him for the rest of my life and he said that as well, so we’re very, very happy.”

Oetjen says she has known Waldeck, who works in the medical industry, for a long time.

“Adelaide is a small place so we’ve been acquaintances for eight or nine years. We just met while we were out with friends (after the show finished) and it went from there, we started dating and then we just couldn’t spend any time apart.

Ali Oetjen now works in real estate.

“He confessed that he’d had a crush on me for nine years, and said to me that he’d always thought I should be his girlfriend, it was so cute, our story.”

But true to form, Oetjen wasn’t afraid to make her affections for him known too.

“I actually made the move on him,” she laughed. “I bought him the first drink.”

While the gorgeous blonde may have gotten over Tim, the knee injury she sustained on the show jumping from a swing rope is still with her.

“It’s getting a lot better. It’s now just about developing the muscle that surrounds the knee but I’m still not able to run. It’ll still be couple of months before I can do that. I was having physio on it every second day after my reconstruction in November.”

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Oetjen says she still sees Anna Heinrich, the woman who eventually won Tim’s heart and has discussed the new man up-for-grabs on the next season of the show.

“I think he looks really nice,” she said of Blake Garvey who was announced this week. “A lot of other Bachelor girls have messaged me and said ‘have you seen him, what do you think’ and the general consensus is that he looks really genuine and nice.”

After deciding that TV presenting and a career in the media wasn’t for her, Oetjen is now pursuing a career in real estate and is a sales consultant at Adelaide based agency, Refined Real Estate.

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“I’m staying in Adelaide, I have a fantastic job at Refined and I love it. I love that you can create massive amounts of wealth investing in property and it’s the quickest and easiest way to create wealth. I love seeing the potential in property and I love dealing with people.”

In between her real estate ambitions, Oetjen is also currently an ambassador for Nivea Men Clear Effect and has been helping men to realise the importance of having great skin, particularly in their online dating profile pictures.

No stranger to the dating scene, Oetjen said it’s easy to find out a lot about a guy just by looking online.

“You have to be careful about the image you’re putting out there.”

After all, 87 per cent of young Aussie women in a Nivea Men Clear Effect Study said they admitted to stalking a guy online before going on a date and of those, 84% got a second opinion from their girlfriends before accepting.

It seems Mr Waldeck has passed the profile picture test, but she declined the offer to share a selfie of the pair with us - although we did get a sneak peek in these Instagram shots.

We imagine he’s extremely good looking — and has great skin.

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