Oxford, NC: what USGS's seismic model says

USGS's ASCE 7-16 seismic design model - the same standard building codes use - places Oxford in Seismic Design Category B: Low seismic hazard. Code requires basic seismic detailing (bracing, connections) but no special structural system restrictions. That puts Oxford in the 34th percentile nationally for seismic hazard - higher than 34% of the 4,875 US cities USGS was checked against here.

Oxford by the numbers

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.056g, short-period spectral response 0.116g, 1-second spectral response 0.056g. Among 147 North Carolina cities in this dataset, Oxford ranks 117 for seismic hazard, the 21th percentile within the state. About 8,972 people live in Oxford, North Carolina.

Bracing and bolting: the actual cost

Outside California, no state-level retrofit grant equivalent to Brace + Bolt could be found for North Carolina. A typical retrofit still runs $5,000-$10,000 nationally, about $7,000 for a common single-family job.

Earthquake insurance for a Oxford home

Outside California, earthquake coverage is typically sold as an endorsement added to a standard homeowners policy, not a separate product - worth asking about directly when getting a home-insurance quote for a Oxford address.

More on how this number was built

The methodology guide covers exactly how USGS's public design-maps API produced Oxford's numbers. The guide to what a Seismic Design Category actually means covers why a category is never a substitute for an engineer's assessment of one specific house.