While at university, Holt met Zara Dickins, the daughter of a Melbourne businessman; there was an "instant mutual attraction". They made plans to marry once Holt had graduated, but after a financial dispute chose to separate. Zara went on a trip to Britain, where she was introduced to James Fell, a British Indian Army officer. She accompanied Fell to India, and then in early 1935 returned to Australia where Holt again proposed marriage. She declined his offer, and married Fell a short time later, going to live with him in Jabalpur. Holt had entered parliament by that time, and was soon being profiled as "the most eligible bachelor in parliament". He briefly dated Lola Thring, the daughter of his father's business partner, F. W. Thring, but his widowed father Tom was also interested in her (to his son's "disgust"). Tom Holt married Lola in 1936, and their daughter Frances (Harold's half-sister) was born in 1940; Tom Holt died in 1945.