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Aaron, I just finished five 40x20x20 MELAMINE cages for about $75-80ea. They are probably a little larger than I needed, but I wanted everything to be uniform when stacked. Since I'm heating with lightbulbs, or trying to right now, I don't have much expense. I purchased the 5/8" BLACK cabinet grade melamine from a local custom millwork shop for around $45 per sheet.....it is the good stuff with a thick coating sprayed on the wood.

I worked it out so I could get five cages from 3 sheets and added an additional sheet of 1/4" black melamine coated MDF for the back. Although I do have extensive carpentry experience, I opted not to wrestle 60 lb sheets and I had them cut everything by lazer for an additional $12.50 per sheet. Well worth the cost for flawless cuts. Light fixtures were $0.99 ea and 9' cords were around $1.79 ea. I went with 1/4" glass as it is much tougher and looks nicer than 1/8"....JMHO. Glass per cage was right at $20. Black tracking from www.outwaterplastics.com was also VERY affordable. I think it came out to around $0.10 per foot.....but it's been so long I can't remember exactly.

Melamine $180
cutting $ 50
Lights & cords $ 13
Glass $104
Perch holders $ 7
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Total $354/$75 per cage give or take.

And the finished products......Just to give you an idea on size, that girl in the top foreground is around 2000 grams and istting over a jumbo water crock.

If you need as many cages as you say, you definately have some long days ahead of you. These cages took about an hour each to assemble. I'm going to order materials to build 3 more this week and I'll be figuring things up for building some 30" stacks as well. I had these down to very little waste and still used most of that for the litter dams. If you have the time, it's worth building your own. They are much nicer than you can buy. BTW, I can carry and stack these cages by myself. Melamine is heavy but these are managable.

Good luck.