We scrounged too, and probably only spent $100-200 on materials - paint, insulation, shingles, hinges, latches, chickenwire, and a couple of 2x6 boards that we bought. Everything else was scrounged/ recycled. I'll post pics, but brace yourself; we're kind of rednecks
The coop itself is converted from a shed that my kids used as a playhouse when they were small. We took out the windows and recovered the outside with leftover siding pieces from friends (with a 5x8-ish coop, the scraps from "real" projects are just right.) The inside walls and ceiling are old fence boards from a fence a friend of ours tore out and replaced. I considered painting them, but I actually love the look of the boards inside, almost like a little Chicken Cabin
The window opens on hinges and has a latch for locking at night, but the window guard is one of those junky wire shelf/ closet organizer thingies we'd pulled out of our closets (and replaced with REAL shelves, *finally*) You can barely see it in the picture, but the roost are held up with triangular shelf supports from the DIY area of the hardware store. The building sits on 6 large cinderblocks, allowing air flow under the coop, and giving us the option to move the building in the future if we choose to.
The run is made with two 2'x8' roof trusses we scrounged from a construction site, 2'x6' boards along the bottom, and more recycled fence boards through the middle. The trusses are sunk in concrete on the vertical end, and mounted to the coop with deck brackets. (The fence boards you can see in the back is my actual fence behind the coop.) The roof of the run is recycled metal siding from a storage shed my neighbor dismantled and tossed. Not visible in the picture is the run door, also made from fence boards and 2'x6'. The whole shebang covered in chickenwire that's buried below ground 8-10 inches or so. The chicken door opens and closes by a cable, run through a ring at the ceiling inside and out through a hole to the outside, where it hangs on an outside ring with a hook. Does that make sense? To open every day, we just unhook it from the top ring and pull it down to the bottom ring and hook again.
And yes, that is a wheel ramp we're using for chicken access
We could have had fancy, but we mostly wanted functional. If there's a construction site anywhere near you, where new houses or apartments are being built, check the dumpsters - you'd be amazed at how many partial pieces of various materials get tossed because they're not big enough to build a house (but totally fine for a little coop). Ask your neighbors and friends, too, if they're doing any remodeling or anything; you may really score (and save a gob of money) with coop building supplies.
