Welcome to another soon-to-be-happy-woodburner,
Yeah, the roller-coaster-ride of picking out and installing a new stove can be painful. Some people manage to do it gracefully, others of us not so much, but we learn a few things on the way.
Since you're a former woodburner, I assume you've already been concentrating on putting aside seasoned wood for the upcoming burn season, and have at least a few cords split, stacked, under cover.
You've already determined the budget, which is a big piece of the picture. You didn't state whether that was before or after tax credit, and that amount is big enough to be a game-changer. Your climate is cold enough that you can do a significant amount of warming with the stove--however, the cost of NG ought (I would hope!) to be low enough there that you're not going to see a return-on-investment payoff as quickly as some of us in other regions. My stove, chimney, and installation came to around $5--after the credit, it was $3500, a big difference for me, and because stove oil is expensive here, I expected the stove to have paid for itself by the time it's saved me less than 1000 gallons of stove oil. Ended up having to buy firewood for this year, so that's pushing the payoff later, but you get the general picture: the numbers aren't always what they seem.
One approach that people can find helpful is to then decide what's important in terms of material: steel, cast iron, or stone. Having lived with the first two in many stoves over many years, I knew that I wanted stone this time, so that helped narrow down my search. All three have advantages and disadvantages, so this is where a `know thyself' approach comes in handy. Take the time to think over how you live, and what your heating priorities are, and I think you'll find you lean towards one of these. If you want more info about their basic differences, just ask.
The next big question to ask yourself is how you want to use it. You've already stated that you want to heat your home with this, and that's part of it. How about the other possible functions: cooking, baking, heating water? What's your lifestyle? SAHM/D or work-from-home employee/self-employed? Commuter away from the house 50+ hours a week? Will you have any other source of heat, or is this the whole enchilada?
The ask yourself (and your SO/family if you are so blessed) how important esthetics are to you. How much pleasure will you get out of looking at a beautiful stove, and what is a beautiful stove in your eyes? One Well-Known Manufacturer (we all know who I mean) decided that pretty is as pretty does, and their owners clearly agree. Others of us appreciate appearance enough to be willing to load more often that twice a week, and empty ashes twice a season. Only you can answer this question, and it's worth the time to consider it.
How many BTU's, approximately, will you need to heat your house? Look at your previous stove size and gas consumption, consider your house well, determine whether you could significantly cut fuel useage by insulating, beefing up windows, etc. Pick a stove size range based on this (sounds like a mid-size `parlor stove would be your goal here).
How long a firebox do you want? Some people are fine w/cutting wood to 16", others consider that to be more cuts than they want to fuss with, and prefer a 20" split.
How significant is your relationship with the dealer, and knowing that the manufacturer stands behind their stove, spare parts are available?
How important is having a window? How big do you want it?
How many doors do you want? If one, front loading or side loading?
Cat or non-cat is another question that you can use to narrow down your choices. You can find plenty of threads here to discuss the pros and cons. When you find the answers to these questions, you'll see that your choices will start to sort themselves out.
For me, initial budget was not so significant as was the payback question.
I knew I wanted stone, so that narrowed my choices to Hearthstone, Woodstock, and Tuviliki. My budget ruled out the latter.
Some cooking would have been nice, but not my primary reason for getting a stove. If that had been a dealmaker, I would have picked the Fireview.
I wanted something that would help ameliorate oil prices, help heat part of the house, and serve as a just in case backup. I got more than I bargained for in this area when I was forced to go over to heating entirely with wood. I got lucky, and the stove I chose heated my whole house for the rest of the winter.
I liked longer firewood, so that leaned me towards the Hearthstone.
I was impressed, remain impressed, by the Woodstock customer service philosophy, but I had a good relationship with the local Hearthstone dealer, so that didn't factor in as much as it would have if I didn't trust the local dealer to do right by me. I also lacked a truck, time, and tools to do the installation myself, and it was the wrong time of the year to be figuring it all out. I wanted the simplicity of writing the check and letting someone do the install for me.
I knew that the glass viewing area was a big thing to me, and Hearthstone has a beautiful window with a gorgeous view of the secondary burns.
I leaned away from cat a bit because I knew that I might have to burn some marginal wood, and I also knew I'd have teen-things (and their friends) in the house using the stove as well as me, and wanted the simplest operation possible. THose leaned me towards non-cat.
I liked the option of two doors.
This process was not nearly as smooth as I'm making it out to be, but I'm glad I went through the grief of thinking it all out as well as I did, because I've never had any doubts that I picked the right stove for myself as a result. Feel welcome to get on here and obsess about the process. We're wired to find that interesting (see my sig line).
