Unreinforced masonry is illegal in most of California- it essentially fractures into a swarm of heavy projectiles during an earthquake- which is a bigger risk than fires here. Brick homes are very common on the east coast where they don’t have frequent earthquakes.

Commercial style construction with steel beams and reinforced concrete is extremely expensive, and not very warm/classic looking. It is used in a tiny fraction of extremely high end custom homes for wealthy people that like modern and brutalist style homes.