If y is 2,851, 1% of Y is

Excellent question, but let's rephrase it.

Suppose you have a square of surface area of 2851.

What would be a hundredth of such square?

What would be surface area of that hundredth.

Why hundredth? Because percent denotes hundredths cent is a latin word for hundred. You would usually encounter similar word that describes 100 years: century.

Well it is actually very easy. Just divide 2851 into 100 pieces and look at what is the area of one piece.

So a single piece has an area of 258.1.

Hope this helps. :)