Newrez, which does business as Shellpoint Mortgage Servicing, has filed a trademark infringement lawsuit against a firm with a name “confusingly similar” to the d/b/a it has used for years.
David George Novelli, a California resident, owns Shellpoint Mortgage Servicing LLC, according to the U.S. District Court complaint filed this week in South Carolina. Novelli’s company is registered in Charleston, South Carolina.
The plaintiff said in the lawsuit that the defendant’s use of the Shellpoint name leads to “confusion in the community (legal and otherwise) by creating the false and mistaken impression that the infringing entity is affiliated, connected, or associated with Newrez.”
Pennsylvania-based Newrez has used the Shellpoint name since acquiring an entity using it.
Newrez became aware of Novelli’s Shellpoint in early 2025, when the former company realized that legal records and other mail were going to the wrong organization, court documents show.
The plaintiff claims it has not received “pre-litigation documents,” including legal demands from borrowers and their counsel. The confusion has impacted Newrez’s ability to resolve disputes, according to the lawsuit.
Newrez said it has used the trade name Shellpoint for more than a decade in commerce in South Carolina and across the United States, while the owner of the other firm registered his company in June 2023, court documents show.
The Rithm affiliate has spent “time, money, and resources” marketing and promoting products and services under the name Shellpoint, so the existence of a firm going by a similar name is “injurious to consumers and homeowners,” the legal filing notes.
Newrez is asking for the federal court in South Carolina’s Columbia to grant it undisclosed damages and block the outside firm from using the Shellpoint name. The plaintiff also wants to get its hands on any legal documents that have been accidentally sent to the other firm, and have the defendant provide an “accounting of all services furnished and products sold” under the Shellpoint Mortgage Servicing LLC name.
Novelli could not immediately be reached Wednesday.
Recent trademark infringement lawsuits filed in the industry include a federal case Mortgage 1 Inc. filed in January against a similarly-named company that spelled out the numeral. Mortgage One Funding is the defendant in that case.
In addition, Loandepot sued two organizations in 2024 for allegedly having similar logos to its real estate services platform, mello.
The litigation against Flashhouse LLC real-estate platform fello has been settled. The second complaint against Melio, a payment platform app, was still pending at the time of this writing.
