I bought a propane fireplace a few years ago, and I really absolutely enjoyed using it.
It is not that cold here where I live even during the winter time months, so I hated turning my furnace on because it cost quite a bit of currency in electricity to run it. I did use my furnace for a few winters, but then, I stopped using it because I got sick of the high electric bill. It would be warm some afternoons and cold other afternoons, so I had to turn my furnace on and off all of the time anyways. It was just a pain. I ended up going a couple of months one winter time without using any type of heater, and that was cheaper, but I got quite frigid at times. My neighbor proposed that I get a propane fireplace since propane is cheaper than electricity. I took her advice, and I bought a propane fireplace. I used that propane fireplace for about three years. It worked great! It had a little bit of a propane smell which I did not certainly care for, but it was not too bad. I got used to it after a little while, and I usually could not smell it at all! Just a few weeks ago, I noticed that my fireplace was having trouble with igniting; After a few afternoons of struggling to light it, it finally stopped lighting altogether. I had a neighbor come over and check it out, and he said that it needed a current thermocouple. I bought one, and he will be installing it next week, and I actually can’t wait to have a working fireplace once again.