My husband always gets nervous when I tell him that I'm going to go to garage sales looking for speech therapy materials because his response is always, "but anything can be for speech therapy." The problem is not the money I spend since I usually only spend maximum $10-20 (and get some AWESOME stuff). However, the biggest problem is that my speech therapy closet is overflowing. However, we never have to buy our son toys - we just raid the speech therapy closet.
The way to get your kids to talk is to get at their level. Use what your child enjoys in order to get him interested. The toys don't have to be new. I have bought many toys used from garage sales that have worked wonders. Some of my favorites have been: blocks, bag of cars/motorcycles/planes, Old McDonald game (great for kids who are learning to listen), Animal Train, rattles, matching game, Jenga (great for older kids), etc.