Holly Ridge, NC
Holly Ridge, NC's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Out of every US place USFS scores, Holly Ridge lands at the 86th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — a figure built from its 1,605 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 Holly Ridge at the 83rd percentile, close to its 86th-percentile risk score.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Most of Holly Ridge's buildings (51.8%) 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 Holly Ridge ranks
Holly Ridge scores 86th nationally and 94th within North Carolina — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Holly Ridge ranks 4,450 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 8,751 by building count (1 is largest). Within North Carolina alone, it ranks 45 of 772 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for North Carolina on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Holly Ridge
Holly Ridge's 86th-percentile, very 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.
Hardening a home in Holly Ridge
Holly Ridge's 51.8% Indirect-exposure share points at embers, not flame contact, as the main pathway — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing rank ahead of defensible space here. Detail in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 1,605 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Holly Ridge. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Holly Ridge, see the exposure-zones guide.