Builds the forecast and the model.
Turns your history into a forward-looking model you can actually steer with: revenue, headcount, and spend projected out far enough to make a decision before you have to make it.
Nacho ordinary finance leadership
Financial leadership without the CFO salary
Nacho matches growing businesses with vetted, 100% US-based Fractional CFOs who own the forecast, the cash plan, and the pricing, starting at $125/hr.
Free 30-minute call. Every match backed by the Nacho re-match guarantee.
The short answer
What is a Fractional CFO?
A Fractional CFO is an experienced Chief Financial Officer who leads your finance function part-time, usually 1 to 3 days a week. They own forecasting, cash strategy, pricing, and the numbers you steer the business by, exactly like a full-time CFO. Through Nacho, a Fractional CFO costs $125 an hour.
The word "fractional" describes the schedule, not the seniority. A Fractional CFO is not a senior bookkeeper and not a spreadsheet contractor. It is a career finance leader who has already owned the function somewhere else, taking on your company as one of a small number of clients.
Finance is the function most small businesses staff backwards. They hire someone to record the past long before they hire anyone to plan the future, and then run growth decisions on a bank balance. A Fractional CFO is the fix for that gap without a $250,000 salary sitting on payroll.
It helps to see the four finance roles as a stack. A bookkeeper records what happened. An accountant or CPA makes it compliant and files the taxes. A controller makes sure the monthly close is accurate and on time. A CFO decides what all of it means and what the company should do next. You need the bottom of that stack before the top is worth paying for.
- Seniority
- Full C-level finance experience
- Schedule
- Usually 1 to 3 days a week
- Reports to
- You, the founder or CEO
- Owns
- Forecasting, cash, pricing, and the money relationships
- Cost through Nacho
- $125/hr from one monthly Talent Budget
- Based in
- The United States, 100% of the time
The job itself
What does a Fractional CFO actually do?
A Fractional CFO builds your forecast, manages cash and runway, sets pricing against real delivery costs, translates the monthly books into decisions, and handles the bank, lender, and investor conversations. The work is judgment about the future, not data entry about the past.
Manages cash and runway.
Builds the cash flow view, tells you how many months you have, and flags the crunch while there is still time to do something about it instead of the week it arrives.
Fixes pricing and unit economics.
Works out what each product, service, or client actually costs to deliver, then tells you which ones are quietly funded by the rest of the business.
Turns the books into decisions.
Your bookkeeper records what happened. A Fractional CFO reads it, explains what it means, and recommends what to do next in language you can act on.
Runs the money relationships.
Handles the bank, the lender, the line of credit, and the investor conversation. Shows up prepared with numbers that hold up under questioning.
Gets you ready for diligence.
Whether you are raising, borrowing, or selling, someone will pull your numbers apart. A Fractional CFO cleans up the story before that happens, not during.
What a Fractional CFO does not do is your bookkeeping. They work on top of it. If the books are behind or unreliable, that gets fixed first, usually by your existing bookkeeper or accountant, because forecasting on bad data is worse than not forecasting at all.
Timing
When should you hire a Fractional CFO?
Hire a Fractional CFO when the financial decisions in front of you are bigger than the visibility you have. The usual trigger is a business past the point where the founder can hold the numbers in their head, facing a call about pricing, hiring, borrowing, or raising.
Signs you are ready
- You are making big decisions off the bank balance instead of a forecast.
- You cannot say confidently how many months of runway you have.
- Revenue is growing and cash is getting tighter, and nobody can tell you why.
- You are raising money, taking on debt, or preparing to sell the business.
- You have never tested your pricing against what delivery actually costs.
- Your accountant tells you what happened last year. Nobody tells you what happens next quarter.
When it is the wrong hire
- Your books are not current. A Fractional CFO working on bad data produces confident nonsense. Fix the bookkeeping first.
- What you need is tax filing. That is a CPA engagement, not a CFO one.
- You want someone to run payroll and pay the bills. That is a bookkeeper or controller role.
- You are pre-revenue with one product decision left to make. Modelling a guess is expensive entertainment.
- You are not going to change pricing, spend, or headcount based on what you learn.
We would rather tell you on the discovery call that your books need attention before a CFO does than sell you a leader who cannot work with the data you have. If the real gap is capacity, an Executive Assistant or Specialist solves it for less.
Real numbers
What does a Fractional CFO cost?
A Fractional CFO through Nacho costs $125 an hour. There is no placement fee and no separate retainer. Hours draw from one monthly Talent Budget with a $1,000 monthly minimum, so about $2,000 a month buys roughly 16 hours and about $8,000 a month buys roughly 2 days a week.
Finance is the role where the hourly model pays off hardest, because the work is genuinely lumpy. A steady month is a forecast refresh and a numbers review. A month with a loan application, a budget cycle, or a diligence request in it is three times that. You pay for the month you actually had.
The comparison most owners never run is the loaded cost of the full-time alternative. A salary is not the price of an employee. Payroll taxes, benefits, insurance, software, and equipment commonly add 25% to 35% on top of it, and a retained search adds 20% to 25% of the first-year salary in year one alone.
| What you are comparing | Fractional CFO through Nacho | Full-time CFO |
|---|---|---|
| Rate | $125/hr, published up front | $200,000 to $300,000 base salary, negotiated |
| Typical schedule | 1 to 3 days a week | 5 days a week |
| Payroll taxes and benefits | None. They are not your employee. | Commonly adds 25% to 35% on top of salary |
| Recruiting cost | None | 20% to 25% of first-year salary for a retained search |
| Equity | None | Frequently expected at this level |
| Time to first day | About a week from the discovery call | 2 to 4 months to search, close, and start |
| Ramp-up | Arrives having run the function before | 30 to 90 days before they truly own it |
| Commitment | 3-month initial term, then month to month | At-will in name, expensive in practice |
| If the fit is wrong | Free re-match under the Nacho Guarantee | Severance, a second search, and lost quarters |
| Illustrative annual cost | About $96,000 at 2 days a week | About $312,000 loaded on a $240,000 salary |
Salary and search-fee ranges above are broad US market ranges for the role and vary widely by industry, region, and company stage. Treat them as a planning starting point, not a quote. The Nacho column is our published rate.
What $125 an hour actually buys
- $1,000 a month is about 8 hours: a monthly numbers review and a maintained cash forecast.
- $2,000 a month is about 16 hours: the review, the forecast, plus real work on pricing or a specific decision.
- $8,000 a month is about 64 hours, roughly 2 days a week: full ownership of the finance function through a raise, a close, or a turnaround.
Up to $200 of unused budget rolls over each month. Everything bills as one flat monthly Talent Budget, and if you also need an Executive Assistant at $40/hr or a Specialist at $65/hr, they draw from the same budget. The only other fee is the $300 Delegation Strategy Plan, which comes before your first match. See how pricing works.
The process
How hiring a Fractional CFO through Nacho works
You book a free 30-minute discovery call, we build a $300 Delegation Strategy Plan, and we introduce you to 1 to 3 hand-picked Fractional CFOs from our vetted, 100% US-based network. Most clients meet their first match within about a week.
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Book a free discovery call.
Thirty minutes, no obligation. Tell us what you cannot see in your numbers. We will tell you honestly whether a Fractional CFO is the right role, or whether your first move is cleaner bookkeeping.
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We build your Delegation Strategy Plan.
For $300 we scope the engagement in writing: what the Fractional CFO owns, how many hours a month that takes, what the first 90 days should produce, and how you will know it worked.
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You meet your shortlist.
We hand-pick 1 to 3 Fractional CFOs from our vetted, 100% US-based network and send you their backgrounds. You interview them. Nobody starts until you say yes to a specific person.
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We handle the paperwork.
Contracts, payments, and onboarding run through Nacho. Your Fractional CFO starts on an agreed monthly rhythm and reports to you, not to us.
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You scale it up or down.
A 3-month initial term gives the work time to land, then it is month to month. Add hours around a raise or a close, pull back when things are steady, and if the match is not right we re-match you free under the Nacho Guarantee.
Need a different kind of leader?
- Fractional CMOMarketing strategy, budget, and demand
- Fractional COOOperations, process, and delivery
- Fractional CTOProduct, engineering, and architecture
All four roles come from the same network under the same Talent Budget. Compare every Fractional Executive role.
Frequently asked questions
Fractional CFO questions, answered
What is a Fractional CFO?
A Fractional CFO is an experienced Chief Financial Officer who leads your finance function part-time, usually 1 to 3 days a week. They own forecasting, cash strategy, pricing, and the numbers you steer the business by, the same way a full-time CFO would, but you pay only for the time you use.
What is the difference between a Fractional CFO and a bookkeeper?
A bookkeeper records transactions and keeps the ledger accurate. That is backward-looking and essential. A Fractional CFO works on top of clean books and is forward-looking: forecasting, cash planning, pricing, and the decisions those numbers should drive. You need the bookkeeper first.
What is the difference between a Fractional CFO and an accountant or CPA?
A CPA handles tax filing, compliance, and often the year-end financials. Their job is to be correct for the government. A Fractional CFO is a strategy role: what to charge, what to spend, when to hire, and whether the plan holds up. Most companies keep both.
What is the difference between a Fractional CFO and a controller?
A controller owns the accuracy and the close: making sure the monthly numbers are right and produced on time. A Fractional CFO owns what those numbers mean and what you should do next. In smaller companies one person sometimes covers both, but they are different jobs.
How much does a Fractional CFO cost?
Through Nacho, a Fractional CFO is $125/hr with no placement fee and no separate retainer. Hours draw from one monthly Talent Budget with a $1,000 monthly minimum, so roughly $2,000 a month buys about 16 hours and roughly $8,000 a month buys about 2 days a week. A $300 Delegation Strategy Plan is the only other fee, and it comes before your first match.
How many hours a month does a Fractional CFO work?
Finance work is lumpier than most. A steady engagement often runs 16 to 40 hours a month for forecasting, the monthly review, and cash planning, then spikes around a raise, a loan, a budget season, or a sale.
When should a small business hire a Fractional CFO?
The common trigger is a business past roughly the point where the founder can hold the numbers in their head, where decisions about pricing, hiring, or borrowing carry real consequences. If you are making six-figure calls off the bank balance, you are past the point.
How long does a Fractional CFO engagement last?
Nacho engagements start with a 3-month initial commitment so the work has time to land, then continue month to month. Many clients keep a Fractional CFO on a light ongoing rhythm indefinitely, scaling hours up around events like a raise or a budget cycle.
Can a Fractional CFO help me raise money or get a loan?
Yes. Preparing the model, cleaning up the story, and sitting in the lender or investor conversation is core Fractional CFO work. It is also one of the clearest cases for hiring one, because the cost of showing up unprepared is far higher than the engagement.
What if the Fractional CFO is not the right fit?
We re-match you free under the Nacho Guarantee until the fit is right. It is a re-match guarantee, not a money-back guarantee. Every person in the network lives and works in the United States, so a re-match never means going offshore.
Ready when you are
Know your numbers before the next big decision.
Book a free, no-obligation discovery call. Tell us what you cannot see in your finances and we'll tell you honestly whether a Fractional CFO is the right fix.