Which order does this site use — and why?

Orders, Compared — In the Open

Three famous published orders run American personal finance. They agree on most of the skeleton and disagree in a few honest places. This site hides none of it: here is each order, where they differ, and exactly which one the sequencer computes — with the one refinement we made, named.

The sequencer uses the community Prime Directive order, with the 5–10% APR debt band shown explicitly rather than buried. Reasons: it takes the employer match earliest (the arithmetic there is not close), it is maintained in public by a community rather than sold, and its debt banding is stated in rates, which a calculator can apply honestly.

Where they honestly disagree

The match: the community order and Money Guy take it at step 2. Baby Steps waits until 15% investing at step 4 — a behavioral bet that debt focus beats match arithmetic. Skipping a 50% match on $3,000 of contributions leaves $1,500 a year unclaimed; that is the size of the disagreement, in dollars, not adjectives.
The emergency fund: Money Guy funds reserves after high-interest debt; the community order splits it — starter cushion first, full fund after the match and expensive debt. Both agree a cushion exists before investing; they argue about its size at each stage.
Debt order: rate-first (community, Money Guy) versus smallest-balance-first (Baby Steps). Rate-first is cheaper in interest, every time; balance-first produces earlier wins, which its author argues keeps people going. The sequencer shows the rate-first math and says so.

Orders, Compared — In the Open

The three orders

The Personal Finance Community Order (the 'Prime Directive')

The Money Guy 'Financial Order of Operations'

The Baby Steps (Dave Ramsey)

Where they honestly disagree