Silver Lakes, CA
How exposed is Silver Lakes to wildfire?
USFS scores Silver Lakes at the 51st national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (modestly above the national average for wildfire risk), a figure built from 2,744 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Silver Lakes's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 57th percentile nationally.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Most of Silver Lakes's buildings (81.9%) sit in the Indirect zone, where wind-blown embers rather than flame front are the mechanism USFS is scoring — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing are the interventions this pattern favors, more than defensible space alone.
How Silver Lakes compares
Silver Lakes ranks lower within California (11th percentile statewide) than its 51st national percentile suggests alone — a calmer spot in a state where wildfire risk generally runs high. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Silver Lakes ranks 15,372 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 5,858 by building count (1 is largest). Within California alone, it ranks 1,393 of 1,570 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for California on its state page.
Silver Lakes and the insurance market
Silver Lakes 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 51st-percentile score like Silver Lakes's can end up mattering for. More on the disclosure law.
What would actually reduce this score
Because 81.9% of Silver Lakes's buildings sit in the Indirect zone, sealing the ember pathway (vents, roofing, gutters) is the intervention this page's data actually supports — see the home-hardening guide.
Where Silver Lakes's figures come from
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 2,744 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Silver Lakes. The exposure-zones guide covers what Silver Lakes's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.