Buena Vista, MI
How exposed is Buena Vista to wildfire?
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Buena Vista at the 7th national percentile for risk to structures, among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — a score built from 3,434 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Buena Vista at the 8th percentile, close to its 7th-percentile risk score.
Where Buena Vista's buildings actually sit
USFS classifies 91.3% of Buena Vista's buildings as Minimal exposure, the largest of the three zones here by a wide margin over 8.5% Direct and 0.2% Indirect — a landscape-level risk rather than a building-by-building one.
Where Buena Vista ranks
Buena Vista's risk sits at a similar level relative to Michigan (22nd percentile statewide) as it does nationally (7th) — this place isn't unusual for its own state either way. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Buena Vista ranks 29,191 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 4,864 by building count (1 is largest). Within Michigan alone, it ranks 583 of 745 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Michigan on its state page.
Buena Vista and the insurance market
Buena Vista's low rating (7th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
What would actually reduce this score
Buena Vista's 91.3% 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.
Where Buena Vista's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Buena Vista's 29,191-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Buena Vista's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.