Charlotte, MI
Charlotte, MI's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
USFS scores Charlotte at the 10th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally), a figure built from 4,427 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Charlotte at the 10th national percentile — 1 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Where Charlotte's buildings actually sit
Only 13% of Charlotte's 4,427 buildings carry Direct exposure and 27% carry Indirect; the remaining 59.9% are Minimal, which shifts the risk driving this page's score toward the surrounding landscape rather than any one structure.
How Charlotte compares
Charlotte's 33rd-percentile standing inside Michigan outpaces its 10th 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, Charlotte ranks 28,435 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 3,854 by building count (1 is largest). Within Michigan alone, it ranks 498 of 745 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Michigan on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Charlotte's low wildfire rating (10th 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
With 59.9% of buildings rated Minimal exposure, Charlotte gets less benefit from structure hardening than a Direct- or Indirect-dominant place would — the home-hardening guide explains why the zone matters.
Where Charlotte's figures come from
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 4,427 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Charlotte. The exposure-zones guide covers what Charlotte's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.