How do you write an equation in slope-intercept form for a line that is parallel to the given line y = 1/3x + 5 and passes through the given point(0,-5)?

1 Answer
Jul 3, 2015

y=1/3x-5

Explanation:

As you might know, lines that are parallel have the same value at x, in this case 1/3. This is because this represents the slope of the line, and same slope means parallel lines.
To get the full equation, there is a formula, but there's also a way if you don't know the formula. Let's do it without the formula first:

Without the formula
Let's write down what we know of our function at the moment:
y=1/3x+c
All we need to know is c. Since we know one of the points, we can just replace the x and y value and solve for c:
-5=1/3*0+c
c=-5
It's that easy! The equation is thus:
y=1/3x-5

With the formula
The formula to find the equation of a line through a given point and with a given slope is:

y-y1=m(x-x1)
where y1 is the y-value of your point, x1 the x-value and m the slope.
In this case, it will be:
y-(-5)=1/3(x-0)
y+5=1/3x
y=1/3x-5