Canadians are welcome as long as they can teach US science ;-) Don't want none of that socialized, watered-down, north of the border science.
As far as cheaper... I got a college buddy from Houston who was stunned to find homes in Missoula (MT hippy town) that were under 100 grand. I got the impression that most of the decent houses around him were going for around $200 grand and that was nothing fancy. As long as you don't want an big chunk of ground, housing is pretty reasonable up here. Summers are livable so you don't need AC and fans run pretty cheap. Sure you need heat most of the winter, but it is a cheap trade-off if you use wood heat. Whatever you do, don't go out and get some wild jacked up 4x4 truck with big tires. They look really funny running down the interstate 40 miles to the grocery store and they get terrible gas mileage. Just get an old beater truck to go to the hills for hunting, fishing, and getting firewood then get momma a minivan or something economical. I have a 1993 chevy and I only groan every time one of my "woodpackers" rolls a block of wood into the side of it.
It might cost a little more to license a vehicle in MT versus TX, but remember MT is one of only a couple of states left that has NO sales tax. Yep, that's right the price they advertise is what you pay! Add that up over a year. Fresh veggies are more expensive, but with Idaho just 20 miles away you have all the cheap potatoes you need to go along with the venison. Gardens don't grow so good in Lima, but occasionally we can get a crop of leaf lettuce or some peas inbetween frosts (it was 26 degrees this morning with a 1/2 inch of snow on the deck, but by afternoon was a comfortable 55).
Now don't think that we are isolated. Lima has highspeed internet access (Netflix is great), I watch all the TV that anyone else watches via satellite, and we have a cellphone tower right here in town.
