Grayslake, IL
How exposed is Grayslake to wildfire?
USFS scores Grayslake at the 33rd national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range), a figure built from 6,653 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Grayslake's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 34th percentile nationally.
Grayslake's building exposure, zone by zone
Most of Grayslake's buildings (94% of 6,653) fall outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones entirely — that doesn't zero out the score above, it means the risk is regional, not structure-by-structure. At 6,653 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Where Grayslake ranks
Compare Grayslake's two percentiles: 83rd within Illinois, only 33rd nationally — a gap of 51 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Grayslake ranks 21,264 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 2,603 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 243 of 1,445 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Illinois on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Grayslake
At the 33rd national percentile, Grayslake rates moderate for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Even with 94% of Grayslake 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
Every one of the two percentiles behind Grayslake's 21,264-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Grayslake, see the exposure-zones guide.