Glad I found this thread. I am in a similar situation. We did a whole house reno 4 years ago. Tore down a chimney and had it rebuilt so we could have an open fireplace. We love the open flames and crackling fire but I am starting to realize I could actually get heat from an insert instead of having that heat go right up the chimney. Starting the process of looking at inserts very soon.
We have had inserts for over 40 years. We are on our second one and we love them. They actually cut down our heating bill. I will never go back to an open fireplace.
When we were buying our house 10 years ago, as I walked down the stairs to the basement I fell in love with the larger “family” room with a fireplace. ( although the pink mortar and stones were ugly in my opinion ( think 70’s style) ). So while the purchasing paperwork was going on I stopped by a stove/hot tub shop to inquire about what I needed to check out before lighting a fire in the open fireplace. It didn’t take long talking to the guy at the shop to convince me of the inefficiency of an open fireplace and had me sold on getting an insert. They were supposed to come look and get me a quote. It took forever and several phone calls to finally get them out to look. And then a couple more months and calls to get the quote. I finally decided they weren’t too concerned with getting my business and went elsewhere. An old college acquaintance was in that line of work and I almost bought a Vermont castings stove from him. At the last minute I changed my mind and got a Hearthstone Manchester stove from a different outfit. ( that decision was based 95% on the looks of the stove) Knowing what I know now I would possibly get a different stove and do the install a little differently. But it works for me as is. I would never consider an open fireplace for heating. I like the ambiance of a fireplace but I would have to live quite a bit further south before I had one.
