North Auburn, CA
How exposed is North Auburn to wildfire?
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts North Auburn at the 95th national percentile for risk to structures, in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — a score built from 5,525 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, North Auburn's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 93rd percentile nationally.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
44% of North Auburn's 5,525 buildings sit in USFS's Minimal exposure zone, with only 26.5% rated Direct — risk here comes from regional burn probability more than proximity to burnable vegetation at the structure itself. At 5,525 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
North Auburn against the rest of the country
North Auburn ranks lower within California (73rd percentile statewide) than its 95th national percentile suggests alone — a calmer spot in a state where wildfire risk generally runs high. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, North Auburn ranks 1,662 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 3,117 by building count (1 is largest). Within California alone, it ranks 423 of 1,570 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for California on its state page.
North Auburn and the insurance market
North Auburn's 95th-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.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Even with 44% of North Auburn 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 North Auburn's 1,662-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond North Auburn, see the exposure-zones guide.