Still learning...and searching

Well after looking at a bunch of wood stoves I've learned that my cabin brick surround & flue is meant for a gas stove. So it's back to the beginning. On our way home this weekend we stopped at a hardware store that has a nice stove department and were real impressed by the Vermont Castings Radiance on display there. VERY realistic looking logs but OMG the price! I started this adventure looking at $600 woodstoves (which the wife shot down for being made in China), ratcheted it up a big notch to $1200-1500 wood stoves and now to get the same look I'm looking at $2300? The Stardance is a better size for my needs at 24" wide but the price isn't much better.
I'm assuming I can do better on price than a small-town hardware store but probably not by a whole lot. Local Craigslist has nothing. Any other ideas?

I'm also going to need to learn about vent pipe and how to install this to a fireclay flue. This plate steel box is what's already there but I guess I need to pull it out if I have to use B-vent or direct vent piping.

The Detroit area isn't a good place for stove shopping so I'm not going to be able to see a big selection of stoves. Thanks for reminding me about the VC bankruptcy. I had read that here but forgot. I really don't want to spend $2200 on a gas stove but I do want good realism in the fire and the VC sure had that. Is there a short list of stoves I can search for that have logs that look real both when cold & lit? BTU output is low on my priorities. Size (~24" wide max), realism & price are way more important to me.

Well I don't want to make this my new hobby so I went back to the hdwr. store that had the VC Stardance and negotiated with them awhile. I got an existing stock '07 Stardance for $1200. I haven't seen anything I like better for the money. In this area most stove stores are more like yuppy boutiques and you can't even buy a boxwood stove for that.

I don't know if the discount is because it's a pre-crazy-steel-prices model or if they just want to get the good VC stoves out to make room for the crummy ones to come.