The Best Order Of Operations To Save For Retirement

Looking to start saving and investing? What account or order of accounts should you use first? Your 401k? IRA? HSA?

I'm a big fan of methods and orders of operations for doing things. I think that it is essential to have a set plan for executing tasks, especially long term tasks like saving for retirement. But what's the best way to go about funding retirement? What is the proper order to save?

Remember back in elementary school the order of operations for math - "Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally"? I always found that useful - parenthesis, exponents, multiplication/division, addition/subtraction.

Its rules and order that make things easy to remember, just like PEMDAS from elementary school.

So, what is the best order of operations for saving for retirement? Let me break it down for you, and show you the exact strategy I'm using as well.