I'm new to owning a corn snake but nothing's gone wrong so far. I got my corn for $10 from a local breeder and she was only a few days old but she had shed and eaten a pinkie(probably 8-10 inches). She is an Okeetee phase corn and I've had her for about 3 weeks. Right now I feed her 1 pinkie every 5 days and she's doing great.
For cage decor I have some cork bark, fake leaves(she loves to climb around in those), a rock cave, a water bowl, and some other stuff. She seems to like it in there and the important thing is to make sure that there are plenty of places to hide. My cage setup cost around $50-60(that includes cage, heat pad, and other accessories).
Hope this helps!