Savings Priority Calculator
Once you're saving real money each month, the tricky question is what to do with it. Pay down the credit card? Capture the 401(k) match? Stash money in an HSA? Open a Roth? This tool puts every option in order based on your income, your employer plan, and what you can save, so each dollar lands in the highest-impact place first.
Each step is funded in order until your monthly savings runs out. The amount shown is what to put in per year, with a per-month equivalent.
401(k) up to your employer match
This is free money. Putting in $12,500 unlocks $12,500 from your employer. That's an instant 100% return on every dollar you contribute.
Backdoor Roth IRA
Your income is above the direct Roth limit, so use the Backdoor Roth. It's a legal workaround where you put money into a Traditional IRA and immediately convert it to a Roth. End result: same tax-free growth as a regular Roth.
Max out your 401(k)
You've already captured the match. Filling the rest of your 401(k), up to $23,500 total for the year, gets you a tax break today on every dollar you put in.
Regular brokerage account
No special tax break, but no contribution limits and no withdrawal restrictions. This is your bridge money if you want to retire before 59½, since every dollar here is yours to spend whenever.
Total saved per year
$60,000
$5,000/month
Tax-advantaged room left on the table
$0
You're using every drop of tax-advantaged space available to you.
Simplifications: uses gross income as the proxy for MAGI (your real Roth eligibility cutoff), ignores state and local taxes, ignores 457 plans, SEP-IRA, and Solo 401(k) for self-employed earners, and assumes 2026 IRS contribution limits. The match-step assumes you contribute the full amount needed to capture every employer-match dollar. Married couples should run the calculator separately for each earner. Only the Roth phase-out toggle reflects joint filing here. Not financial advice.
Want to know exactly where you are in this order?
Planned reads your actual accounts and shows you which step of the priority order you're on right now, what's funded, and what's next.
Frequently asked questions
Common questions about how the priority order works for high earners, answered plainly.
I'm a high earner. Should I even bother with a Roth IRA?
Yes. The IRS only blocks the front door. For 2026, single filers above $168,000 (or married filing jointly above $252,000) can't contribute directly to a Roth IRA, but the backdoor Roth strategy still works: contribute to a Traditional IRA, then convert it to a Roth right away. The end result is identical to a direct contribution. The only catch is the pro-rata rule, which gets messy if you already have pre-tax money in any IRA (Traditional, Rollover, SEP, or SIMPLE). If that's you, the calculator flags a warning to talk to a CPA before you pull the trigger.
What's a backdoor Roth IRA, in plain English?
It's a two-step workaround. Step 1: put money (up to $7,500 in 2026, or $8,600 if you're 50 or older) into a Traditional IRA. Don't take a tax deduction for it. Step 2: a few days later, convert that Traditional IRA into a Roth IRA. There's no income limit on the conversion step. The IRS officially blessed this strategy in 2018, so it's not a loophole that might close tomorrow. The whole thing usually takes 10 minutes once your accounts are set up.
What's the mega backdoor Roth and how do I know if I have it?
The mega backdoor lets you push way more than the normal $23,500 401(k) limit into your retirement accounts (up to $70,000 total in 2026 once you count your contributions, your employer's match, and the after-tax money). It only works if your 401(k) plan allows two specific things: (1) after-tax contributions on top of your normal pre-tax or Roth contributions, and (2) either an in-plan Roth conversion or in-service withdrawals to a Roth IRA. Most plans don't have both. The fastest way to find out: ask HR or your benefits provider whether your plan supports 'after-tax contributions with in-plan Roth conversion.' If they say yes, you have it.
Why is my HSA on this list? It's a health account.
An HSA is the only account that gives you three tax breaks: you don't pay tax on the money going in, you don't pay tax on the growth, and you don't pay tax on the way out (as long as it's for medical expenses). Nothing else does that. Even better: after age 65, you can pull money out for any reason and just pay normal income tax (same as a Traditional IRA). The pro move is to pay current medical bills out of pocket and let the HSA grow for decades. By the time you retire, it's another six-figure retirement account. To use one, your health plan needs to be HSA-eligible (a high-deductible plan).
Should I really pay off debt before getting the 401(k) match?
Only if the debt has a really high rate (think credit cards at 20% or more). Paying off a 20% credit card is a guaranteed 20% return, which beats almost any investment. But if your debt is 6% (like most car loans or older mortgages), get the 401(k) match first. A 100% match on every dollar you put in is a 100% instant return. The match always wins against moderate-rate debt. The calculator only flags 'high-interest' debt above 7% for early payoff because that's the threshold where guaranteed payoff starts beating likely market returns.
Why does the tool only ask me to build a $1,000 emergency fund? Isn't that way too low?
$1,000 is a starter cushion, not a full emergency fund. The idea is to have just enough to cover a surprise (a tire, a medical copay, a flight home for a funeral) without going back into credit card debt while you're trying to pay it off. Once your high-interest debt is gone, build the emergency fund up to 3 to 6 months of expenses before going hard on retirement accounts. The calculator doesn't show that step because it's a separate goal that lives in your savings account, not in this priority order.