Forest Ranch, CA
Forest Ranch wildfire risk explained
Out of every US place USFS scores, Forest Ranch lands at the 99th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — a figure built from its 572 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Forest Ranch at the 99th percentile, close to its 99th-percentile risk score.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
100% of Forest Ranch's 572 buildings sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone, roughly 572 structures close enough to burnable vegetation for flame contact, not just embers — 0% fall in the Indirect, ember-only zone and 0% are Minimal.
Where Forest Ranch ranks
Forest Ranch scores 99th nationally and 93rd within California — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Forest Ranch ranks 184 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 16,209 by building count (1 is largest). Within California alone, it ranks 105 of 1,570 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for California on its state page.
Forest Ranch and the insurance market
Forest Ranch's 99th-percentile score lands in California, the only two states requiring a wildfire disclosure at sale. California's surplus-lines homeowners market passed 300,000 policies for the first time in 2025, driven by carriers pulling back from wildfire-exposed areas statewide. The disclosure-law guide covers what it requires.
What would actually reduce this score
Forest Ranch's 100% Direct-exposure share means lot clearing around the structure typically outweighs any single material upgrade here. The home-hardening guide ranks the options for a place shaped like this.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 572 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Forest Ranch. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Forest Ranch, see the exposure-zones guide.