Pinos Altos, NM
How exposed is Pinos Altos to wildfire?
Out of every US place USFS scores, Pinos Altos lands at the 99th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — a figure built from its 207 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Pinos Altos at the 99th national percentile — 1 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Pinos Altos's building exposure, zone by zone
USFS classifies 81.2% of Pinos Altos's buildings as Direct exposure, higher than its 18.8% Indirect share and far above its 0% Minimal share — a profile where 168 structures sit close enough to vegetation that lot clearing matters most.
How Pinos Altos compares
Pinos Altos scores 99th nationally and 98th within New Mexico — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Pinos Altos ranks 231 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 24,611 by building count (1 is largest). Within New Mexico alone, it ranks 12 of 495 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for New Mexico on its state page.
Pinos Altos and the insurance market
Pinos Altos's very high rating (99th percentile) puts it among the places where the national carrier-pullback trend is most relevant — not a guarantee of a coverage problem, but a reason to shop rather than assume.
Hardening a home in Pinos Altos
Because Direct exposure dominates in Pinos Altos (81.2%), 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 Pinos Altos's 231-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Pinos Altos, see the exposure-zones guide.