Fractional CFO · Home Services · Fleet-Based Businesses
There's money in your business right now that isn't showing up on your P&L.
If you run 5–10 trucks, there's money in your business your bookkeeper can't find. Revenue earned but never invoiced. Pricing that hasn't kept up with labor. Fleet costs nobody has ever properly calculated. We find it — and build the systems to keep it.
60 minutes. No prep.
No pitch.
No commitment.
Trusted by growing owner-led companies
20+
Years of senior CFO leadership
50+
Companies grown and advised
$500M+
Capital advised and deployed
"
Tom brought clarity to our numbers and strategy. It changed the way we make decisions.— Jody Stoehr, CEO
Where the money is
Your books show revenue. They don't show what's leaking out.
If you run a home service business at $1.5M–$8M, money is leaking in ways your books don't show. Here's where it goes.
$30K–$80K
per hidden underperformer / year
Underperforming unit subsidy
"I've got 8 trucks running — but the profit doesn't reflect it."
Without per-truck P&Ls, losing trucks hide inside a profitable fleet. They disappear in the revenue number. They don't disappear from your costs.
$80K–$200K
on $3–5M revenue / year
Stale pricing against rising labor
"Costs have gone up. I'm not sure my pricing has kept pace."
Labor is up 12–18% in most markets. If your pricing hasn't moved at the same rate, every job is less profitable than it used to be. That gap adds up fast.
$60K–$150K
on $3–5M revenue / year
Unbilled and under-billed work
"We're busy every week, but the profit doesn't match the work we're doing."
Change orders missed. Materials not billed back. In trades businesses, 2–4% of completed work never makes it onto an invoice. On $3M revenue, that's $60K–$120K a year for work you already did.
$15K–$40K
in real working capital cost / year
AR you're carrying for free
"The business looks profitable on paper — but cash is always tighter than it should be."
When $300–500K sits in AR past 60 days, you're financing your customers. That's a real working capital cost — usually papered over with a line of credit instead of fixed.
Fleet decision
$40K–$120K
in misallocated capital / year
The fleet decision made without the right numbers
"We've run some numbers on owning versus a fleet management company — but I'm not sure we're running the right ones."
Real fleet ownership cost needs depreciation schedules, maintenance reserves, downtime cost, and per-vehicle utilization. Most owners skip those and make a $300K+ commitment on incomplete math. Fleet management isn't always the answer. Knowing the real number always is.
Why you can't see it
You've outgrown your bookkeeper. A full-time CFO is overkill.
At some point the financial picture stops keeping up with the business. Decisions get bigger. Answers get murkier. The bookkeeper is doing exactly what they've always done — it just isn't enough anymore.
01
Decisions are getting bigger — and you're guessing.
Hires, equipment, fleet expansion, new service lines. Getting it wrong costs real money. You need numbers you can stand behind before you commit.
02
The books and the reality don't match.
The P&L shows what happened — not what's happening or where the margin is actually going.
03
You need a CFO. Not more reports.
A bookkeeper records. A controller produces. A CFO finds the money. At your size you need the third — not full-time, and not at a junior rate.
This isn't a management problem — it's structural. Bookkeeper-level financials weren't built to surface per-truck economics, catch pricing erosion, or model fleet cost. The money is hidden because the infrastructure to find it doesn't exist yet. That's what changes.
Results
Two scenarios. Both already in the business.
The margin we find isn't new money that has to be earned. It's already in the business — invisible until the right financial infrastructure surfaces it. Here's what that looks like in practice.
HVAC · $3.2M Revenue
$147K
identified in margin leakage — two underperforming trucks surfaced in 38 days
An 8-truck HVAC company in the Southeast was growing revenue but couldn't understand why margins kept shrinking. Every truck looked busy. A per-truck breakdown revealed two routes were operating at a net loss once fully-loaded labor burden, fuel, and service call conversion rates were separated out.
"I thought I had a revenue problem. Turns out I had two trucks costing me $70K each per year and I had no idea. We restructured both routes within 90 days."
— Owner, 8-truck HVAC company · Southeast U.S. · Illustrative based on real leakage patterns
Electrical · $4.1M Revenue
$94K/yr
in unnecessary cost avoided — fleet management contract walked away from after true ownership cost was modeled
A 9-truck electrical contractor was 60 days from signing a fleet management agreement at $1,850 per truck per month. A full ownership cost model — incorporating actual depreciation schedules, real maintenance reserves, per-truck downtime cost, and utilization rates — put true all-in ownership cost at $1,240 per truck per month.
"I was two signatures away from locking in $200K a year in unnecessary cost. The model took three weeks to build. It was the most valuable thing we've ever paid for."
— Owner, 9-truck electrical contractor · Mid-Atlantic · Illustrative based on real leakage patterns
Included at no charge
The Financial Clarity Snapshot
Built from your actual numbers, not a template. Delivered within 7 days of your call. Yours to keep no matter what you decide.
CFO Growth Experts
Financial Clarity
Snapshot
Snapshot
Prepared for: [Your Business Name]
1
Cash position and 13-week outlook
Your cash flow benchmarked against similar businesses. Where you stand today — and what's arriving in the next quarter.
Enables: knowing what you can safely commit to in the next 90 days
2
Profitability by unit
P&L by truck, service line, or job type. Usually the first time an owner sees which units are carrying the margin — and which ones aren't.
Enables: knowing where to double down — and what to fix or cut
3
Your three highest-leverage moves
Three specific changes ranked by dollar impact — the highest-leverage moves in your business in the next 90 days.
Enables: a clear starting point that isn't guesswork
4
Your decision, modeled
The decision you brought to the call — new truck, fleet restructure, pricing change — modeled with your actual numbers.
Enables: a data-backed answer to the question you came in with
5
What working together looks like
If there's a fit, here's exactly what the first 90 days look like — what gets built, when, and what you'd be signing up for.
Enables: a clear picture of the engagement before any commitment
🛡 This document is yours to keep — whether or not you decide to move forward with a CFO engagement. No strings attached.
How it works
Three steps. No commitment until it's earning its keep.
Every engagement starts the same way — a conversation, a diagnostic, a proposal. No surprises, no lock-in, and a real deliverable before you commit to anything ongoing.
01
Financial Clarity Call
Walk through what's working, what's unclear, and the decision sitting on your desk. You'll leave with at least one thing you didn't know about your own business.
02
Financial Clarity Snapshot
A personalized diagnostic — your numbers benchmarked, the leakage quantified, the highest-leverage moves identified. Yours to keep whether or not you engage further.
03
CFO Growth Engagement
A 90-day foundation — cleanup, structure, and your first real financial model. Then ongoing fractional CFO leadership as long as it's producing value.
$4,000/mo
Month-to-month after the first 90 days
90-day foundation sprint
Ongoing fractional CFO leadership
30-day cancel after month 3
No setup fee
No setup fee. No annual contract. No trap.
30-day notice to pause or cancel after the first 90 days. If the engagement isn't producing measurable value, you don't stay — and you won't want to.
What we do
Five focus areas. One integrated engagement.
No piecemeal projects. Every engagement runs on the same five priorities — sequenced to deliver cash visibility in 30 days, unit-level P&Ls in 60, and a full decision rhythm by 90.
5
Priority
Framework
Framework
01
Cash & Working Capital
You always know what you have and what you can safely deploy.
02
Profitability Per Truck
You know which trucks carry the margin — and which ones don't.
03
Pricing & Mix Strategy
Repricing decisions backed by your numbers — not gut feel.
04
Decision-Grade Growth Models
Every capital decision modeled with scenarios you can defend.
05
Owner Decision Rhythm
You stop running the books and start running the company.
Who this is for
Built for one type of business. Specifically.
We work exclusively with owner-led home service companies operating their own fleets. If this is you, the financial complexity is real — and so is the recoverable margin.
Plumbing
HVAC
Electrical
Landscaping & Lawn Care
General Contracting
You are
- $1.5M–$8M in annual revenue
- 5 to 10 trucks, currently owner-managed
- Family member or part-time bookkeeper on QuickBooks
- Profitable on paper — but cash is tighter than the numbers suggest
You're facing
- Bigger decisions — fleet, hires, expansion — without the financial model to back them
- Revenue that's growing but profit that isn't keeping pace
- A P&L that doesn't tell you which trucks, jobs, or service lines are actually profitable
The decision most of our clients are sitting on
You're weighing whether owning your fleet still makes sense — or whether a management company pencils out better. You've run some numbers. You're not confident you're running the right ones.
Built to be worth something
The recovery pays for the engagement. The exit multiplies it.
Home service businesses at this revenue level are exactly what PE buyers want. The financial infrastructure that finds your margin today determines what a buyer pays tomorrow.
01
The recovery alone often covers the cost.
Most engagements surface $120K–$320K in year one. Against a $48K engagement cost, that's a 2.5–6.7× return before exit is even part of the conversation.
02
Clean financials command higher multiples.
Clean books with CFO-grade unit economics command 4–6× EBITDA. Messy books get 2–3×. On $600K EBITDA, that's over $1M in exit value — before any operational change.
03
The math compounds both ways.
Recovered margin raises EBITDA. Higher EBITDA at a higher multiple creates exit value that typically beats the engagement cost by 10–30×. The numbers are in the table.
| Conservative | Moderate | Strong | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Margin recovered | $120K/yr | $200K/yr | $320K/yr |
| Engagement cost | $48K/yr | $48K/yr | $48K/yr |
| Net P&L improvement | $72K/yr | $152K/yr | $272K/yr |
| EBITDA multiple | 4× | 4.5× | 5× |
| Additional exit value | $480K | $900K | $1.6M |
Illustrative ranges based on real leakage patterns in owner-led home service businesses at the $1.5M–$8M revenue stage. Your Financial Clarity Snapshot identifies the specific recovery opportunity in your business.
The engagement costs $48,000 per year. The conservative scenario alone creates $480K in additional exit value — a 10× return before a single dollar of new revenue is generated.
Who you'll work with
Senior CFO experience. Owner-operator voice.
20+ years as a CFO across owner-led businesses. Tom has been across the table from buyers, lenders, and board members. He knows what clean financials look like — and the exact gaps at this stage that keep most businesses from being worth what they should be.
20+ years as a CFO, controller, and financial strategist across owner-led businesses
50+ companies advised through growth, capital raises, and complex financial transitions
$500M+ in capital advised and deployed across advisory engagements
Sits on the operator side — not the consulting side
Tom Schipper
Founder & Fractional CFO · CFO Growth Experts
20+
Years CFO experience
50+
Companies advised
$500M+
Capital deployed
$4K/mo
Month-to-month
"
My job isn't to give you more reports. It's to find the money that's already in your business and make sure every decision you make is one you can defend — and that when you're ready to step back, the business reflects exactly what you've built.
Common questions
Answered straight up.
Yes, no card and no fee. We would rather invest 60 minutes finding the right fit than run a hundred unfocused calls. Either way, you leave with something useful.
A written diagnostic delivered 5-7 days after your call. Five sections built from your specific data: cash position benchmarked, profitability by unit, your three highest-leverage moves ranked by dollar impact, your decision modeled out, and what an engagement would look like if there is a fit. Yours to keep regardless.
Yes. The leakage is consistent: trucks that look profitable in aggregate but aren't, pricing that hasn't kept up with labor, work that's completed but never invoiced, and AR carried as free credit. In a $3-5M home service business, $120K-$300K in undetected margin is common. The Snapshot puts a number on what's in yours.
It's the most common decision we work through, and the most frequently made on incomplete numbers. Real fleet ownership cost requires depreciation, maintenance reserves, per-vehicle utilization, and downtime. Most QuickBooks figures understate true cost by 20-40%. The Snapshot models your actual cost per truck. The Clarity Call surfaces whether you're comparing the right things.
Most owners who book aren't ready. They're figuring out if they should be. The session answers that question either way. If the right move is to wait, Tom will say so.
No. A few short prep questions: revenue range, truck count, the decision on your desk. No documents, no financials. The call runs on your knowledge of your business and the benchmarks Tom brings.
Your accountant looks backward: what happened, what to file. A CFO looks forward: what to decide, what to charge, what to invest in. Different roles. This call is the second one.
Yes. PE buyers are actively acquiring home service businesses at this size, but only ones with clean financials. CFO-grade unit economics can mean 4-6x EBITDA at exit versus 2-3x for messy books. On $500K EBITDA, that's a $1-2M difference. The financial infrastructure pays for itself in the engagement and compounds at sale.
If there's a fit, Tom builds your Snapshot. From there you decide whether to engage for the 90-day implementation. If you'd rather run with what you got from the session, that's fine too.
Tom personally. That's why we cap sessions per week. The value is in talking to someone who's seen 50+ businesses at this stage, not a discovery rep.
One call. No obligation.
60 minutes. Find out what's already in your business.
Walk through what's working, what isn't, and the decision on your desk. No prep. No pitch. No commitment. You'll leave with at least one concrete number about your own margin.
Accepting new clients — limited availability
Book a Financial Clarity Call