Really cost of housing alone doesn't tell the full story without considering the jobs/income sources in the area.

I have noticed an irony that if housing in an area is really cheap you probably won't be able to afford to live there unless you are already a retiree who doesn't care about long emergency response time - because the highest paying job in the area is say a resturant manager at the local diner.

Before the pandemic economic growth was very urban concentrated - remote working normalizing might reverse the trend but there are still some service and infastructure demand constraints - chances are they need reliable high speed internet.