answer:A “traditional brick fireplace” is going to be very difficult to erect in an existing frame house that doesn’t have one, and even more so if it’s a typical house in the Northeast with a full basement. The reason for that is that you also need a very substantial chimney, and that means “brick” and that means “tons of weight”. For that reason, you need to build from the bottom up. So the fireplace you want on the ground floor needs support from the basement. Most often, that is done by extending the masonry work to the basement floor and building up from there. (A lot of houses with ground floor fireplaces will also have basement fireplaces, since the foundation for the chimney is there anyway, and all that’s required is a separate flue.) That all means a lot of expense, moving brick and mortar through the dwelling (and a lot of mess as people and materials move in and out), as well as wall or roof opening for the flue (or flues). A wood stove is simpler, because it doesn’t require the same chimney. Wood stoves can get by with uninsulated stovepipe until you run through the wall (usually) or roof with an insulated “thimble”. Much cheaper, much less work – insignificant weight considerations. You could compromise with a gas “fireplace” that allows you to simulate the look of burning of (artificial) “logs” hiding a gas ring. That also requires much less flue ducting, since a gas fire doesn’t have as much to exhaust (and even heat considerations can be lessened), so that you can often get by with a horizontal PVC duct through the outside wall to exhaust.