> "I'm not the parent poster, but having moved to a rural area in January I've already experienced this. I spent a couple of days identifying target companies, and another couple getting my resume together and writing decent cover letters. After three weeks I was well into the interview process with five companies, and had an acceptable offer in hand after six."

For remote positions, that experience just seems too atypical for anyone to hear your story and conclude that taking a remote job and moving to such a rural place would be safe, job-wise. Your experience sounds really atypical. That's bordering on the kind of turn-around you'd have in a super dense urban area like SF with a hotly demanded skill set. Definitely not typical for remote work.

I am not sure why you brought up the topic of expenses. No doubt they are much cheaper in rural areas... but if you lose a job it doesn't matter. Savings only lasts so long, and for something like a mortgage, especially in places where property values won't grow very much and often go down, it's a big risk to literally bet the farm that you would be able to find another remote job quickly in an emergency.

You also mention a lot about planning ahead, and of course that is great advice. But I'm specifically only talking about the sort of sudden job loss and extended spell of unemployment that you couldn't plan for. Think of someone just starting out in a new remote job without the chance to build savings yet.

It's way less of a risk if you have years of living expenses saved up and can float yourself, but that's usually not the position someone is in when they have to weigh up the relative risks of living in a rural area on a remote job.