Belmont, MA
How exposed is Belmont to wildfire?
Belmont's 8,467 buildings earn a 27th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Belmont at the 25th national percentile — 3 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Belmont's building exposure, zone by zone
Most of Belmont's buildings (97% of 8,467) fall outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones entirely — that doesn't zero out the score above, it means the risk is regional, not structure-by-structure. At 8,467 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Belmont against the rest of the country
Belmont's 60th-percentile standing inside Massachusetts outpaces its 27th national percentile — this is a hotter spot than most of its own state, even though the state as a whole runs cooler nationally. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Belmont ranks 22,971 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 1,967 by building count (1 is largest). Within Massachusetts alone, it ranks 101 of 248 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Massachusetts on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Belmont's moderate wildfire rating (27th percentile) isn't the kind of score driving the carrier pullback making news in the highest-risk Western markets — but a standard homeowners quote is still worth comparing on its own terms.
What would actually reduce this score
Even with 97% of Belmont outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones, basic hardening — gutter maintenance, ember-resistant vents — is inexpensive relative to the regional burn-probability risk noted above. Details in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Belmont's 27th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Belmont, see the exposure-zones guide.