Ashville, AL
Ashville wildfire risk explained
Ashville's 1,494 buildings earn a 80th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — well above the national norm for wildfire risk. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Ashville at the 83rd percentile, close to its 80th-percentile risk score.
Ashville's building exposure, zone by zone
USFS classifies 90.2% of Ashville's buildings as Direct exposure, higher than its 9.8% Indirect share and far above its 0% Minimal share — a profile where 1,348 structures sit close enough to vegetation that lot clearing matters most.
Where Ashville ranks
Ashville scores 80th nationally and 75th within Alabama — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Ashville ranks 6,321 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 9,195 by building count (1 is largest). Within Alabama alone, it ranks 150 of 592 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Alabama on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Ashville's 80th-percentile, high rating is the kind of score behind a broader national pattern: insurers pulling back from the highest wildfire-risk markets, non-renewing or declining new policies outright, most visibly in California. Shopping around, not assuming automatic renewal, tends to matter here.
What would actually reduce this score
Ashville's 90.2% Direct-exposure share means lot clearing around the structure typically outweighs any single material upgrade here. The home-hardening guide ranks the options for a place shaped like this.
More on how this number was built
Ashville's 80th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Ashville, see the exposure-zones guide.