The Subaru AWD system is one of the most sophisticated on the market, and Subarus get excellent reliability ratings from Consumer Reports. I’m sure you see lots of Subarus on the roads in New England. They are popular cars anywhere it snows a lot.
I own an older Legacy AWD station wagon and a 4WD Ford Ranger. I prefer driving the Legacy when there’s snow on the ground.
Even though the Legacy is AWD, I still put winter tires on it when the weather turns cold. The tires make a huge improvement in winter traction. I never worry about getting where I’m going in that car.
The only disadvantage I can think of with AWD is the need for carefully matched tires. You can’t just replace one or two. All four tires have to be as closely matched as possible to avoid damage to the AWD system. Routine tire rotation is all that’s normally needed to keep the tires matching.
There is a bit more maintenance expense with AWD or 4WD than 2WD, but that is true no matter what brand you are looking at.
There are lots of nice vehicles out there. Have fun shopping.