Barbara Kavovit Opens Up About Her Friendship With Luann de Lesseps And Future Projects Amid RHONY Rumors!

Barbara Kavovit is rumored to be the newest cast member of The Real Housewives of New York City's upcoming eleventh season. Barbara  has been spotted filming scenes with the cast of the Bravo hit reality series in various events. The construction mogul reveals she can’t comment on the casting news, but says she’s longtime friends with one of the franchise’s original Housewives - Luann de Lesseps.

“I love hanging out with my friend Luann [de Lesseps] — we go way back,” she told PEOPLE. “I guess people are talking about how we’ve been seen together lately, but we’ve been friends forever. We met when our sons were very little and have been friends ever since.”

Kavovit says she has no problem hanging out with women who are known to have strong personalities and opinions. “I would say I’m definitely a boss,” Kavovit says. “I would say that women and men are afraid of me in some aspects. I don’t see myself as being intimidating, but I’m told I am.”

Kavovit spent years leading Anchor Construction, one of the largest female-owned general contracting companies. She’s currently CEO and founder of another construction company, Evergreen Construction, which offers top-to-bottom construction management services to clients in the Big Apple, reports the publication.

“If you attack something and are passionate, you’ll eventually conquer it,” she says of her career. “I’m still conquering it. Every day is a fight, but I have the drive to keep going. You have to be confident and relentless.”

Under the name Barbara K, she has also launched DIYVA, a nationally distributed line of tools marketed toward women, and she has also written two books. She's currently working on her third, which is a novel about a young woman who wants to build the tallest skyscraper in New York City.

Kavovit says she wants to encourage young women to break into her still-male-dominated field. “In this business, I learned that you have to be five times better than the male counterpart to be considered equal,” she told PEOPLE. “My goal with young women is always to inspire them. I think this industry is desperate for women.”

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