Bolton Valley, VT
Bolton Valley, VT's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Out of every US place USFS scores, Bolton Valley lands at the 15th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — a figure built from its 78 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Bolton Valley's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 14th percentile nationally.
Where Bolton Valley's buildings actually sit
USFS classifies 88.5% of Bolton Valley's buildings as Direct exposure, higher than its 11.5% Indirect share and far above its 0% Minimal share — a profile where 69 structures sit close enough to vegetation that lot clearing matters most.
Bolton Valley against the rest of the country
Within Vermont, Bolton Valley ranks higher (46th percentile) than it does nationally (15th) — one of the more fire-exposed places in a state that, overall, scores lower than that. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Bolton Valley ranks 26,708 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 29,990 by building count (1 is largest). Within Vermont alone, it ranks 94 of 179 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Vermont on its state page.
Bolton Valley and the insurance market
Bolton Valley's low wildfire rating (15th 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
Bolton Valley's 88.5% 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 Bolton Valley's 26,708-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Bolton Valley, see the exposure-zones guide.