hagen chinchilla cages. i love them as a starter cage. and you can find them in classifeds for pretty dang cheap if you keep your eyes open for them. they can hold a maxium of 3 boys or 4 girls. girls normally have to be around 8 weeks though to not squeeze through the bars. even new at the pet store its only $100 which seems fairly low given the amount of rats and the customabilty of the cage. just about any toy will fit in it and if the space in use wisely 3 boys can be very happy in it. you just need to make sure that each has a place to go away from the others if they want. and they are SO EASY to expand. just get another one and zip tie to the top.
here's a few pictures of some of my set-ups with it:
the space wasn't as wisely used as it could be here. for the most part the ropes were ignored (so much for my rattie jungle gym idea...) and i had yet to cover the second floor in lino tiles which is needs as the spacing on the bars is wide to be walking on.
this was my set-up in april. there's three cages and all are zip-tied together. there's a hole in the second tray for them to get in and out of. my current set-up is similar but the second tray is the second level instead of the thrid which makes it much easier to clean. i've found that they like having a potty there too.
this is the monster of a cage i ended up with (over expanding.. ). there's 4 cages zip-tied together here. the cage only stayed like this for a couple weeks then i downsized to save my own life. the cage was wobbly nad though secured to wall still felt unstable to me when cleaning. also the floor was not exactly even in the old apartment and cleaning that top level on a step ladder and you were taking you're life in your hands... also, when it was this size i actually would lose some rats inside the cage... now that its only 3 teirs i can normally find them all within a few minutes.
the following is close up shots of when it was 4 tiers so you can see all the toys i was able to put in there.
bottom 2
top 2
i don't have any pictures of my current set ups. i have a one tier going for stewie (foster boy) and Bribery (my neutered boy-the only one safe to keep stewie company), my 3 tier that has a slightly different set up then when it was a 4 tier and my sick cage for tween. i also can't seem to find older pictures of the cage(s) to show previous set-ups. but there is a lot of different ways and toys you cna put in there.