Northbrook, IL
Northbrook wildfire risk explained
Out of every US place USFS scores, Northbrook lands at the 24th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range — a figure built from its 11,752 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Northbrook's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 27th percentile nationally.
Where Northbrook's buildings actually sit
USFS classifies 95.3% of Northbrook's buildings as Minimal exposure, the largest of the three zones here by a wide margin over 4.7% Direct and 0% Indirect — a landscape-level risk rather than a building-by-building one. At 11,752 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
How Northbrook compares
Compare Northbrook's two percentiles: 69th within Illinois, only 24th nationally — a gap of 45 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Northbrook ranks 23,979 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 1,329 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 447 of 1,445 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Illinois on its state page.
Northbrook and the insurance market
Northbrook's moderate rating (24th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
Hardening a home in Northbrook
Northbrook's 95.3% Minimal-exposure share means structure-level hardening matters less here than it would elsewhere — still worth the low-cost basics, per the home-hardening guide.
Where Northbrook's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Northbrook's 23,979-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Northbrook's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.