Samantha is saving up to buy a new bicycle for 250. She already has 50 saved. Samantha plans to save x per week from her allowance. How many weeks (in terms of x) will it take Samantha to save enough money to buy the bicycle?

Answer: It will take Samantha 200x\frac{200}{x} weeks to save enough money to buy the bicycle.

Step-by-step solution

Step 1: Find the remaining amount to be saved

The total cost of the bicycle is 250250 dollars, and Samantha already has 5050 dollars saved. Subtracting the initial savings from the total cost gives the remaining amount she needs to save, which is 200200 dollars.

Step 2: Set up an equation for the total savings after w weeks

Let ww denote the number of weeks required. Since Samantha saves xx dollars each week, the total money saved in ww weeks is x⋅wx \cdot w dollars. Adding this to her initial 5050 dollars gives the required cost of 250250 dollars.

Step 3: Solve for the number of weeks w in terms of x

Subtracting 5050 from both sides gives x⋅w=200x \cdot w = 200. Dividing both sides by xx isolates the variable ww, giving the total number of weeks in terms of xx.

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