Berea, SC
Berea wildfire risk explained
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Berea at the 59th national percentile for risk to structures, modestly above the national average for wildfire risk — a score built from 6,218 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Berea's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 63rd percentile nationally.
Berea's building exposure, zone by zone
6,218 buildings are counted in Berea, and 46.9% of them sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone — flame contact, not just ember cast, is the live possibility for most of them, against 31.4% rated Minimal. At 6,218 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
How Berea compares
Berea ranks lower within South Carolina (17th percentile statewide) than its 59th national percentile suggests alone — a calmer spot in a state where wildfire risk generally runs high. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Berea ranks 12,837 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 2,792 by building count (1 is largest). Within South Carolina alone, it ranks 392 of 474 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for South Carolina on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Berea's elevated rating (59th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
Hardening a home in Berea
Berea's 46.9% 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
Every one of the two percentiles behind Berea's 12,837-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Berea, see the exposure-zones guide.