Barnegat Light, NJ
Barnegat Light, NJ's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Barnegat Light's 1,386 buildings earn a 67th-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.)
Separately from the risk score above, Barnegat Light's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 54th percentile nationally.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
USFS classifies 99.8% of Barnegat Light's buildings as Minimal exposure, the largest of the three zones here by a wide margin over 0.2% Direct and 0% Indirect — a landscape-level risk rather than a building-by-building one.
Barnegat Light against the rest of the country
Barnegat Light's risk sits at a similar level relative to New Jersey (76th percentile statewide) as it does nationally (67th) — this place isn't unusual for its own state either way. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Barnegat Light ranks 10,567 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 9,687 by building count (1 is largest). Within New Jersey alone, it ranks 172 of 700 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for New Jersey on its state page.
Barnegat Light and the insurance market
At the 67th percentile nationally, Barnegat Light carries the high rating that has pushed some carriers to limit new business in similarly-scored places elsewhere in the country. Worth comparing quotes rather than assuming last year's renewal terms still apply.
Hardening a home in Barnegat Light
Barnegat Light's 99.8% Minimal-exposure share means structure-level hardening matters less here than it would elsewhere — still worth the low-cost basics, per the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 1,386 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Barnegat Light. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Barnegat Light, see the exposure-zones guide.