WildfireRiskFinder

Dexter, NM

Dexter wildfire risk explained

High
73rdpercentile nationally

USFS scores Dexter at the 73rd national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (well above the national norm for wildfire risk), a figure built from 592 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)

Separately from the risk score above, Dexter's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 73rd percentile nationally.

What "at risk" means for the buildings here

592Total buildings
19.9%Direct exposure
66.7%Indirect exposure
13.3%Minimal exposure

Most of Dexter's buildings (66.7%) sit in the Indirect zone, where wind-blown embers rather than flame front are the mechanism USFS is scoring — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing are the interventions this pattern favors, more than defensible space alone.

How Dexter compares

Dexter's 73rd national percentile looks worse in isolation than its 44th ranking inside New Mexico does — this place is on the milder end for its own state, by 29 points. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Dexter ranks 8,641 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 15,939 by building count (1 is largest). Within New Mexico alone, it ranks 280 of 495 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for New Mexico on its state page.

Dexter and the insurance market

Dexter's high rating (73rd percentile) puts it among the places where the national carrier-pullback trend is most relevant — not a guarantee of a coverage problem, but a reason to shop rather than assume.

Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it

Because 66.7% of Dexter's buildings sit in the Indirect zone, sealing the ember pathway (vents, roofing, gutters) is the intervention this page's data actually supports — see the home-hardening guide.

More on how this number was built

The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 592 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Dexter. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Dexter, see the exposure-zones guide.