Zearing, IA
Zearing wildfire risk explained
Zearing's 337 buildings earn a 11th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Zearing at the 10th national percentile — 1 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Zearing's building exposure, zone by zone
Only 36.8% of Zearing's 337 buildings carry Direct exposure and 0% carry Indirect; the remaining 63.2% are Minimal, which shifts the risk driving this page's score toward the surrounding landscape rather than any one structure.
Where Zearing ranks
Zearing scores 11th nationally and 21st within Iowa — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Zearing ranks 28,048 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 20,656 by building count (1 is largest). Within Iowa alone, it ranks 812 of 1,017 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Iowa on its state page.
Zearing and the insurance market
At the 11th national percentile, Zearing rates low for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.
Hardening a home in Zearing
With 63.2% of buildings rated Minimal exposure, Zearing gets less benefit from structure hardening than a Direct- or Indirect-dominant place would — the home-hardening guide explains why the zone matters.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Zearing's 28,048-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Zearing, see the exposure-zones guide.