Avery Creek, NC
Avery Creek, NC's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Avery Creek sits at the 60th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — well above the national norm for wildfire risk — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 958 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Avery Creek's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 63rd percentile nationally.
Where Avery Creek's buildings actually sit
958 buildings are counted in Avery Creek, and 79.8% of them sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone — flame contact, not just ember cast, is the live possibility for most of them, against 0% rated Minimal.
Where Avery Creek ranks
There's little gap between Avery Creek's 60th national percentile and its 59th percentile inside North Carolina, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Avery Creek ranks 12,521 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 12,248 by building count (1 is largest). Within North Carolina alone, it ranks 318 of 772 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for North Carolina on its state page.
Avery Creek and the insurance market
Avery Creek's 60th-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.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
With 79.8% of Avery Creek in Direct exposure, defensible-space clearing and ember-resistant construction (vents, Class-A roofing) address the exposure this page's own numbers describe, not a generic checklist. See the home-hardening guide.
Where Avery Creek's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Avery Creek's 12,521-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Avery Creek's dominant direct exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.