Fairfax, SC
Fairfax, SC's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Out of every US place USFS scores, Fairfax lands at the 69th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — well above the national norm for wildfire risk — a figure built from its 1,076 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Fairfax at the 68th national percentile — 1 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Where Fairfax's buildings actually sit
Most of Fairfax's buildings (61%) 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.
Where Fairfax ranks
Inside South Carolina, Fairfax sits at just the 53rd percentile even though it scores 69th nationally — the state's overall wildfire exposure is high enough to make this a relatively quiet corner of it. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Fairfax ranks 9,905 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 11,426 by building count (1 is largest). Within South Carolina alone, it ranks 224 of 474 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for South Carolina on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Fairfax's 69th-percentile, high rating is the kind of score behind a broader national pattern: insurers pulling back from the highest wildfire-risk markets, non-renewing or declining new policies outright, most visibly in California. Shopping around, not assuming automatic renewal, tends to matter here.
What would actually reduce this score
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Fairfax (61% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.
Where Fairfax's figures come from
Fairfax's 69th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Fairfax's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.