Yeah, I mean, it's a guy renting out a GF, he's going to be pretty maladjusted and the entire middle of the chapter was about how naive he is. Honestly, I bet he didn't even mean 'you're dear to me' in a romantic way, he was just trying to convey some very basic level of appreciation for her as a human being but it still came off extremely creepy and saccharine all the same both to the reader and to MC by the author's intention.