Monterey Park, CA
How exposed is Monterey Park to wildfire?
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Monterey Park at the 59th national percentile for risk to structures, modestly above the national average for wildfire risk — a score built from 18,309 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Monterey Park at the 64th national percentile — 4 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Most of Monterey Park's buildings (99.4% of 18,309) 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 18,309 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
How Monterey Park compares
Monterey Park ranks lower within California (17th percentile statewide) than its 59th national percentile suggests alone — a calmer spot in a state where wildfire risk generally runs high. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Monterey Park ranks 12,879 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 779 by building count (1 is largest). Within California alone, it ranks 1,301 of 1,570 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for California on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Monterey Park
Monterey Park sits in California, one of two states that legally require a wildfire-risk disclosure at sale. California's FAIR Plan, the state's insurer of last resort, ended 2025 with 668,609 residential policies after adding 21,859 in Q4 alone — the kind of market shift a 59th-percentile score like Monterey Park's can end up mattering for. More on the disclosure law.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
With 99.4% of buildings rated Minimal exposure, Monterey Park gets less benefit from structure hardening than a Direct- or Indirect-dominant place would — the home-hardening guide explains why the zone matters.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 18,309 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Monterey Park. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Monterey Park, see the exposure-zones guide.