Question

An elderly gentleman passes on. He leaves half of his estate to his wife. He leaves his son $50,000. The remainder of the money is divided as follows: He leaves half of the remaining money to his best friend. He then leaves half of what is now remaining to his church. He donates the remaining $8,000 to the local elementary school for research and implementation of Constructivist learning theory in mathematics education. How much money was originally in this gentleman’s estate?

Answer 1

164,000 is the answer yessss

Answer 2

Let's work backward to find out how much money was originally in the gentleman's estate.

He leaves $8,000 to the local elementary school.

After this donation, the remaining estate is 0.5 (half) of what it was.

He donates half of what is now remaining to his church.

This means the amount before the church donation was $8,000 * 2 = $16,000.

He leaves half of the remaining money to his best friend.

Before the best friend's share, the estate was $16,000 * 2 = $32,000.

He left his son $50,000.

Before leaving his son's share, the estate was $32,000 + $50,000 = $82,000.

He left half of his estate to his wife.

Therefore, the original estate was $82,000 * 2 = $164,000.

So, the gentleman originally had $164,000 in his estate.

Explanation: