Industries / Commercial Painting and Finishes Contractors. NYC Metro. $2M to $10M.

Fractional CFO for Commercial Painting and Finishes Contractors. NYC Metro. $2M to $10M.

Financial leadership for commercial painting, drywall, flooring, and finishes contractors. Crew productivity, prevailing wage compliance, GC payment cycles, and the banker readiness for prevailing wage and bonded work.

Five financial problems specific to this work.

  1. Prevailing wage compliance and certified payroll

    Prevailing wage projects (NYC Local Law, federal Davis-Bacon, state public works) require certified payroll, fringe analysis, and detailed labor cost tracking. Errors trigger debarment risk.

  2. Crew productivity variance

    Same crew on the same building can produce 25 percent productivity variance week over week. Most owners feel it but cannot quantify it. Without quantification, accountability is impossible.

  3. GC payment cycles, retention, and lien rights

    60 to 90 day DSO, 5 to 10 percent retention, lien filing windows that vary by state. Working capital is constantly stretched.

  4. Multi-trade scope creep

    Commercial finishes contractors are often pulled into adjacent scopes (carpentry, light demolition, ceiling). Scope creep eats margin if not managed via written change orders and clean cost tracking.

  5. Bonding capacity and prequalification

    Bonded work expands market access but ties up working capital and adds compliance overhead.

What we do for these engagements.

Result (anonymized).

A $4.4M commercial finishes contractor, NYC Metro, was sale-prep 24 months out. We normalized owner compensation, separated personal expenses, tightened revenue recognition on long-cycle jobs. The initial broker indication moved from 3.6x to 4.9x EBITDA on a normalized $620K EBITDA base. Roughly $800K of additional enterprise value at the same operating performance.

Investment and next step.

Most engagements start with the three-week Diagnostic ($8,000 Standard, $12,000 Premium, $16,000 Comprehensive). After Diagnostic, roughly two-thirds move into the Monthly Retainer at $5,500 to $8,500 per month for CFO scope, or $4,500 to $5,500 per month for Controller scope.

Ready to know what your business actually looks like?

A 25-minute discovery call costs nothing and tells us both whether a Diagnostic is the right next step. If it is not, we will say so and point you in the right direction.

Book a 25-minute discovery call