Custer, WA
Custer wildfire risk explained
Custer sits at the 15th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 469 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Custer at the 19th percentile, close to its 15th-percentile risk score.
Where Custer's buildings actually sit
Only 34.5% of Custer's 469 buildings carry Direct exposure and 28.1% carry Indirect; the remaining 37.3% are Minimal, which shifts the risk driving this page's score toward the surrounding landscape rather than any one structure.
How Custer compares
Custer scores 15th nationally and 19th within Washington — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Custer ranks 26,771 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 17,910 by building count (1 is largest). Within Washington alone, it ranks 506 of 628 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Washington on its state page.
Custer and the insurance market
At the 15th national percentile, Custer rates low for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.
What would actually reduce this score
Even with 37.3% of Custer 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
Custer's 15th-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 Custer, see the exposure-zones guide.