In a village the number of houses and the number of flats are in the ratio 7 : 4 the number of flats and the number of bungalows are in the ratio 8 : 5 There are 50 bungalows in the village. How many houses are there in the village?

Firstly it is important to read the whole question to make sure the all the information you have been given is understood. As we know there are 50 bungalows we can use the ratio of flats to bungalows to find out the number flats. To do this we have to work out the scale factor for the ratio. 50/5 =10. So now we know to get the real number of flats we have to multiply the ratio by 10 8 X 10 = 80  Since we have worked out that there are 80 flats, we can use the ratio of houses to flats to complete the question. Again to do this we must first work out the scale factor for the ratio80/4= 20In order to find the real number of houses we have to multiply the number given in the ratio by 207 X 20= 140140 is the number of houses