Thank you kindly for the informative post. I decided to hold off for now until I can do some additional research although you answered my questions. I am thinking a heating pad applied to the side of the tank along with a light or other heating source will keep the habitat nice and warm. My only concern is the temperatures in my house. I live in an old house that uses forced hot air. Sometimes the temps in my room fall to 60 or so (in the winter) but when the furnace comes on it spikes up to around 70 pretty quickly. In the summer I run the AC but not at night and not during the day as I am not home/sleeping.

I plan to buy the Exo-Terra terrarium as I think they look the best. Should I stick with the 12x12x12, or should I buy the 18x18x12 and stick with that? I guess the best thing to do is get to the local Petco and look at all my options. I just want to make 100% sure that I have everything in order before I get one. Thanks again.

ETA: Is there a product out there that has a thermostat built in to correctly regulate temperatures? I noticed you have mentioned a controller. Could you tell me about that? I have no reptile/amphibian experience going into this. I'd hate for the guy to get too hot while I am at work during the day and being able to set something at a certain temp and have it stay there seems attractive to me.