Question

In a certain area, there are 35 houses to 55 businesses. How do you write the ratio of houses to businesses as a fraction in simplest form. Then explain its meaning?

Answer 1

There are `7/11` times as many houses as businesses.

Explanation:

`"houses":"businesses" = 35:55`

This ratio can also be written in fractional form as:
`color(white)("XXX")35/55`
which can be simplified (by dividing each of the numerator and denominator by `5`)
`color(white)("XXX")=7/11`

If you divided the businesses up into (5 groups of) `11` and then evenly assigned houses among those groups, each group would have `7` houses.