While we have never had an open fire place before, we have had a wood burning stove/heater and are planning to put one in the house we are building this year. They are just beautiful and give that gentle, bone-warming heat throughout the house. They are possibly easier to clean than an open,with the fire and ash being behind the glass door, though I guess I can't really comment. I would strongly recommend you buy one with the fan attachment as this greatly improves the throw out of the warmed air and certainly, the difference can be felt. They are beautiful visually too and nothing is nicer on a cold Winter day, than to have the fire going and be warm and snug inside. Good luck; I hope that helps.

Hmm I find this highly unlikely, I used to be in wholesale internal sales selling Q-Stone a slightly cheaper version of Ceaserstone and we knew for months what the prices would be and could fix prices for our stonemasons I would ring around and get some other quotes.

Get two more quotes. It's not too hard to do yourself if it's outside your budget. Just need to ask your hardware store for the proper equipment and follow the instructions. The other way to look at it, is that wallpaper isn't cheap, and is it worth it to you to have it hung well?

I know someone from Clarendon Homes and they talked about homes costing about $350k which was about $3000/m2. I know extensions in the city cost about $4000 with the high cost of tradies at the moment.