Short answers, pulled from the story.
New Place was William Shakespeare's final residence in Stratford-upon-Avon, where he died in 1616. Built in 1483 by Sir Hugh Clopton, it was a three-storey timber-and-brick house with ten fireplaces and was reportedly the second largest dwelling in the town. Only the foundations survive today.
Shakespeare purchased New Place in 1597 from William Underhill II for sixty pounds. The sale was complicated when Underhill died within two months, having been poisoned by his eldest son Fulke; a formal confirmation of the sale was not negotiated until 1602.
New Place was demolished twice. Sir John Clopton tore down the original structure in 1702 and replaced it with a new house. The Reverend Francis Gastrell, vicar of Frodsham, Cheshire, demolished that second house in 1759 after local disputes over visitors, a rejected garden-extension application, and a tax increase.
New Place passed to Shakespeare's eldest daughter Susanna Hall in 1616. Her daughter Elizabeth Hall, Shakespeare's last surviving descendant, later lived there. After Elizabeth died without heirs in 1670 the house returned to the Clopton family, and the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust acquired the site in 1876.
The first excavations were conducted by James Halliwell-Phillipps in 1862 and January 1864. Further excavations in 2010, 2011, and 2012 were carried out by Birmingham Archaeology; archaeologists from Time Team also visited the dig in 2011, and a programme about the excavation aired on the 11th of March 2012.
Clay pipe fragments found in the New Place garden showed possible traces of cannabis, tobacco, and camphor in a study published in the South African Journal of Science. Researchers noted the pipes cannot be definitively attributed to Shakespeare, as they may date to the 18th century, around two hundred years after his death.