Part-time CFO services

Part-time CFO services are an ongoing engagement with a senior finance executive who owns financial strategy without joining payroll full-time. A standard scope includes:

• Rolling 13-week cash forecast and runway management
• Driver-based annual budget with quarterly reforecast
• Monthly close oversight and management reporting
• Board deck financials and investor communication
• Fundraising model, data room, and diligence support
• Pricing, margin, and unit economics analysis
• Banking, insurance, and vendor negotiation
• Hiring and managing the internal finance team

What is not included: bookkeeping, payroll processing, and tax filing. Those sit with an accounting provider the CFO supervises.

Pricing follows hours and seniority, not company size alone. Typical 2026 US monthly retainers:

• Advisory tier, 8 to 15 hours: $3,000 to $6,000
• Standard tier, 15 to 30 hours: $6,000 to $12,000
• Deep or interim tier, 30 to 80 hours: $12,000 to $25,000

Day rates land at $1,200 to $2,500. Multi-quarter commitments usually earn a 10 to 20 percent discount against the equivalent day rate. Beware of any provider quoting under $2,500 per month for strategic work; at that price you are buying an analyst, not a CFO.

These are different products that are frequently sold under similar names. Outsourced accounting is a compliance and records function: categorize transactions, reconcile accounts, produce statements, file returns. It costs $1,500 to $6,000 per month and it is necessary.

Part-time CFO services are a judgment function: decide what to fund, what to cut, what to charge, when to raise, and what to tell the board. The two are complements. Buying accounting and expecting CFO output is the single most common purchasing mistake in this category.

Three models dominate.

Monthly retainer with defined hours is the default and suits ongoing needs. It creates continuity, board presence, and team management.

Project or event-based engagements suit a fundraise, an audit, a system migration, or a diligence process. Priced at a day rate or fixed fee, typically 6 to 12 weeks.

Interim coverage suits a CFO departure or leave. It is full-time and temporary at $15,000 to $35,000 per month.

Choose retainer when the need repeats monthly. Choose project when the need has an end date. Choose interim when the seat is empty and the board is watching.

Write down three outcomes for the first 90 days before you talk to anyone. Good examples: extend runway by four months without headcount reduction, produce a board-ready operating model, or move the close from 25 days to 10.

Then size the hours against those outcomes rather than against your budget. A common error is buying 10 hours because it is affordable and then asking for 30 hours of output, which produces neither.

Finally, define who the CFO manages, which meetings they attend, and what they present. Authority is what separates a part-time CFO from an expensive reviewer.

A full-time CFO at $300,000 base carries roughly $360,000 to $390,000 in loaded cost once benefits, payroll taxes, and equipment are included, before equity. A part-time CFO at 25 hours per month costs about $114,000 per year.

The relevant question is not which is cheaper, it is whether the role requires five days a week. Below roughly $10M ARR, most finance functions genuinely need two to four days a month of executive judgment plus a competent controller. Above that, the full-time seat starts paying for itself in decision speed.

Five recurring errors:

• Buying a package instead of a person. Firms rotate staff; ask who specifically does the work and how many other clients they carry.
• Accepting a scope document with no deliverable dates.
• No reference from a prior fractional client at your stage.
• Under-hours the engagement, then blames the CFO for shallow output.
• No exit plan. Every engagement should name the trigger that converts to a full-time hire or ends the work.

Post a private mandate on RecruitFractional describing stage, revenue, hours, and outcomes. Reference-verified part-time CFOs respond within 72 hours. You interview directly, run a paid 30-day trial, and pay only for time worked.