You don't have to spend lots of money for your first simple and even slightly advanced projetcs.
For simple circuits you can use a real bread-board, see image on top
here.,
Any non-conducting material can be uses for the base. Insert thumbtacks for solder joints. in
this example (German text) a piece of drywall is being used for the base.
Of course, you'll get lost with this technique when it comes to high-pincount chips.