Lottie has a bag of apples. she gives a quarter of them to fred. lottie gets hungry and eats 5 of them. now lottie has 7 more apples than freddie. how many apples did lottie have at the start?

The answer would be 24.

X=lottie's aples

give 1/4 of them to fred

origianly had 4/4, but gave 1/4 away so now has (3/4) x

eats 5 of them

(3/4) x-5

now she has 7 more than fred (fred has (1/4) x

so

(3/4) x-5 is 7 more than (1/4) x

(3/4) x-5=7 + (1/4) x

add 5 to both sides

(3/4) x=12 + (1/4) x

minus (1/4) x from both sides

(2/4) x=12

(1/2) x=12

times 2/1 both sides

2/2x=24

x=24

she had 24 to begin with