Walterboro, SC
Walterboro, SC's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Out of every US place USFS scores, Walterboro lands at the 71st percentile for wildfire risk to structures — well above the national norm for wildfire risk — a figure built from its 2,361 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Walterboro at the 70th national percentile — 1 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Where Walterboro's buildings actually sit
56.3% of Walterboro's 2,361 buildings fall in USFS's Indirect exposure zone — ember cast rather than direct flame — against 43.7% Direct and 0% Minimal. Vent screens and roofing material matter more here than lot clearing alone.
Walterboro against the rest of the country
There's little gap between Walterboro's 71st national percentile and its 61st percentile inside South Carolina, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Walterboro ranks 9,152 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 6,585 by building count (1 is largest). Within South Carolina alone, it ranks 183 of 474 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for South Carolina on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Walterboro's 71st-percentile, high rating is the kind of score behind a broader national pattern: insurers pulling back from the highest wildfire-risk markets, non-renewing or declining new policies outright, most visibly in California. Shopping around, not assuming automatic renewal, tends to matter here.
Hardening a home in Walterboro
Walterboro's 56.3% Indirect-exposure share points at embers, not flame contact, as the main pathway — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing rank ahead of defensible space here. Detail in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Walterboro's 71st-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Walterboro, see the exposure-zones guide.