Prospective home buyers usually consider how many bedrooms and bathrooms a house has and its price per square foot. But that's not all.
"Seven out of 10 recent home buyers considered natural disaster risk when deciding where to live," says Sara Brinton of Realtor.com.
She says many buyers are growing particularly concerned about wildfires.
So the real estate website now provides information on wildfire risk with a third-party tool called Fire Factor.
It ranks properties on a scale from one to 10 based on their risk of being damaged by wildfire over the next 30 years.
The ranking is based on projected regional fire risk as the climate warms and property-specific factors like topography and vegetation.
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Brinton says buyers value information about wildfire risk. And the ranking can also help sellers to market a home. She suggests that sellers highlight steps they've taken to reduce a property's vulnerability, so consumers can make informed decisions as fire danger grows.
"If there is roofing that's less flammable … if they've removed brush from around the home or installed a sprinkler system or upgraded their windows to make the house more resilient to wildfire, all of those details are really important to feature in the listing," she says.
Reporting credit: Sarah Kennedy/ChavoBart Digital Media
This article originally appeared on Yale Climate Connections
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