Hi Ashley, I know the breed well, was my sister in laws choosen breed all her life and right up til she had her brain injury 10 years ago. The only thing I can fault with a Dane for breed is that they do not live long enough and they break your heart when they go. Danes can run like the wind. I had a friend that used to test-run a luer course for the sitehounds with a dane. Lots of folks think they are slow, but my experience is that they love to run. My sister in laws dane could keep up with galloping full sized horses in the field and often would "hitch a ride" by grabbing the tail and hanging on and running with them. Vickie tried to raise her last puppy while working full time and not using a crate. She is my poster child story for using a very large crate while this breed is young.
Her puppy could rear up and get things off the TOP of the refrigerator. She ate and mangled everything in the house and teethed on sofas, and ate and puked a whole basket full of jolly rancher candies all over the rugs and ruined the hard wood floor chewing. It was when she turned on the stove burned up the whole cabinet next to the stove and almost caught the house on fire that they finally got a crate. After crating, everything went as normal puppies do. Danes grow so fast and folks tend to forget that the massive dog in their house still has a puppy brain.
Vickie had many danes, all were excellent tempermant. The one time she tried to raise two dane puppies from the same litter she found this was a bad idea, they packed together, were not bonding to the owners, but rather to each other and they would work together to chase the horses and deer and anything else that crossed their property. She gave one to her mom and the problem was solved. Her last dane was a heartbreak. Gorgeous male, very tall. He even visited the rehab place when Vickie was being treated after her brain injury. That year he developed a lump on his leg and went lame in one day... He was only 3 years old. Bone cancer. Two weeks after diagnosis he was gone. Only dog that she owned over her whole life that didn't live to be old. I loved her dogs, they were like having mini horses in the house.
She also did one rescue dane gotten well after the puppy munchie stage but still young and that dog was great and lived to be very old. (old for a dane that is)
I advise good fencing, not electric invisible fencing as they get up enough speed and just run through the barrier. I go out with my dogs during the puppy stage and if you supervise you shouldn't have problems with jumping and escaping.
Let me know if you have any other specific questions. Vickie didn't research backgrounds on her dogs, just picked nice puppies with decent parents with good tempermant a must. Some came from breeders that werent famous, just nice decent folks with nice puppies and nice adults. My sister in law loved the black best but had all colors. I advise thinking twice about the odd colors such as blues etc as I have seen skin issues with those. Cant think of anything else, rambling here. Best wishes and if you get a new puppy let us know!