Palatine, IL
How exposed is Palatine to wildfire?
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Palatine at the 26th national percentile for risk to structures, close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range — a score built from 16,557 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Palatine's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 27th percentile nationally.
Palatine's building exposure, zone by zone
70.3% of Palatine's 16,557 buildings sit in USFS's Minimal exposure zone, with only 3% rated Direct — risk here comes from regional burn probability more than proximity to burnable vegetation at the structure itself. At 16,557 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Where Palatine ranks
Within Illinois, Palatine ranks higher (72nd percentile) than it does nationally (26th) — one of the more fire-exposed places in a state that, overall, scores lower than that. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Palatine ranks 23,472 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 875 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 407 of 1,445 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Illinois on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Palatine's moderate wildfire rating (26th percentile) isn't the kind of score driving the carrier pullback making news in the highest-risk Western markets — but a standard homeowners quote is still worth comparing on its own terms.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Palatine's 70.3% 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 Palatine's figures come from
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 16,557 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Palatine. The exposure-zones guide covers what Palatine's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.