How much did I mess up buying this cage?

[lunasrats]

The dimensions are 52×52×113cm which is roughly 20.5×20.5×40.5 inches. I got it because my other option was the furat which seemed overall smaller but after buying it I realized rats need more horizontal space and not just vertical. It has 4 shelves which i could adjust to create 2 extra levels and Ill be freeroaming them at least 2 hours every night during the week and possibly more in the weekends when they warm up to me. Im still stressed that they'll be very unhappy but I cant get my money back and dont have another 200ish € to drop for the furat xl rn:/

(I forgot to mention, its for 2 females)

 

[MinisterPumpkin]

Since you don't have the funds to buy another cage right away, I wouldn't get too stressed. Give them fun things to do in this one -- have fun getting creative with the space. And have fun spending time with your girls outside of their cage. Honestly, rats are so dang smart that my favorite pastime (aside from playing with them) is just thinking up ways of stimulating their active little brains. Give them plenty of love and attention (at their pace, as they get more comfortable with you) and they'll be plenty happy.

When you're looking into a new cage, keep an eye out on local selling sites to see if anyone is looking to sell a used one. When you do get one that you like better, you could probably get at least some of your money back by selling the old one if you're not looking to find some way to expand with it.

But that's actually another idea. With some cage designs, it's possible to kind of combine them. A lot of people do it with the critter/ferret nation type cages, for example. You could peruse some examples of different habitat ideas for inspiration on this forum (in this section) actually.