Matthews, NC
Matthews wildfire risk explained
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Matthews at the 47th national percentile for risk to structures, modestly above the national average for wildfire risk — a score built from 11,316 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Matthews at the 51st national percentile — 4 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Matthews's building exposure, zone by zone
11,316 buildings are counted in Matthews, and 60.2% of them sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone — flame contact, not just ember cast, is the live possibility for most of them, against 28.6% rated Minimal. At 11,316 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
How Matthews compares
Inside North Carolina, Matthews sits at just the 32nd percentile even though it scores 47th 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, Matthews ranks 16,646 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 1,398 by building count (1 is largest). Within North Carolina alone, it ranks 525 of 772 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for North Carolina on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Matthews
At the 47th national percentile, Matthews rates elevated for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.
Hardening a home in Matthews
Because Direct exposure dominates in Matthews (60.2%), the highest-leverage fix is defensible space, not roofing or vents alone — covered in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Matthews's 16,646-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Matthews, see the exposure-zones guide.