Rents for ‘husbands’ rise in this country due to man shortage

The women are forced to go on a special “guy date.”

A nationwide shortage of men in Latvia is increasingly forcing women to hire “husbands of the hour” to help them with household chores.

According to a recent Eurostat report, 15.5% more women outnumber men in Latvia, which according to local media is more than three times the EU average. Meanwhile, according to World Atlas, there are twice as many women over 65 as men.

As a result, the Baltic country found itself unfortunately short of suitable male prospects – a la “The Wicker Man”.

Dania, a single woman who works at the music festival, claims that 98% of her colleagues are women, The Sun reports.

“There’s nothing wrong with that…but to maintain a good balance, you want more men to flirt with or chat with,” she laments. “It’s more fun.”

“That’s why all my friends went abroad and found boyfriends there,” echoed her friend Zane.

To fill the nationwide vacancy of husbands, women like Dania are increasingly turning to services that allow them to rent their husbands short-term to help around the house.

It might sound like the beginning of a bad skin movie, but platforms like Komanda24 have boomed, allowing women to recruit “gold-handed men” for just a few euros to work as plumbers, carpenters, fixers or even install TVs, all without any awkward pick-up lines or dates.

Remontdarbi.lv’s service, meanwhile, allows women to “be a husband” online or over the phone for an hour before they show up within the hour, much like the more suggestive TaskRabbit service.

Upon arrival, these glorified handymen will do everything from painting walls, repairing curtains, and other household chores done during the Latvian male drought.

Why are gender differences so big? Experts attribute part of this imbalance to men having significantly lower life expectancies due to poor health and lifestyle choices, World Atlas reports.

“Men are about three times more likely to smoke, with 31 percent of men smoking compared to just 10 percent of women,” the website states. “Men are also slightly more likely to be obese or overweight, with 62 percent compared to 57 percent of women.”

Renting a husband is not something that happens on the other side of the ocean.

In 2022, Laura Young, a mother of three, went viral after renting out her husband, James, to other women to do odd jobs to make extra money.

The lucrative business is called “Rent My Handy Husband” and James does everything himself, including general DIY, painting, decorating, tiling and carpeting.

James, 42, currently has a full schedule of jobs in November, charging $44 an hour and about $280 a day. Their business has become so popular, they say, that they have even had to turn down work.