I only have experience with Eastern Canada (aka Southern Ontario, Montreal, and the Maritimes), but the only way that I've seen where you'd get a high salary and low cost of living is if you can get Torontoesque salary with a company based in rural areas (which in IT I've found is anything outside of the GTA, K-W, Ottawa, and Montreal...possibly Halifax). They're incredibly rare (I've found two in the 13 years that I've been in the industry), and if the company does go under you're pretty much forced to move to a place where there's high salaries (because there's high competition for talent, natch), and high cost of living (because everyone's moving there...again, obvious I know), as telecommuting opportunities in Canada are practically non-existent. Usually if a place has a low cost of living/low housing costs/etc...., it's because the unemployment rate is ~15% or so, and the IT work is something around 35-40k a year.
tl;dr If you're looking in Canada, you're looking a LONG time.
Montreal has at least cheaper rent went compared to Toronto. Also, the startup scene is arguably more interesting than Toronto if that's something you're interested in. Plus Montreal is a pretty fun place to live. (I lived in Montreal for a year and a half working for a startup.)
tl;dr If you're looking in Canada, you're looking a LONG time.