I had $0.2 or $0.5 or something like that in my paypal when I "started" IM. I started out with selling T-shirts on society6, I used to take fan-arts of celebrities, tweak them a bit in Photoshop, and upload them to society6, then I used to advertise my shop in targeted Facebook groups, Forums, Chat groups etc. Made a few hundred bucks in just a couple months and my only investment was the $1 used to verify my society6 account (that too was given to me by a generous member here, because you know, I didn't even have $1 in my PP back then). Then I invested most of that money in some other projects.
But the thing is, you don't need to spend a lot of money to make a decent amount back, it doesn't really take money to make money on the Internet if you invest time in it, because you know, time is money. And once you make a few hundred bucks from a (probably unstable) income source, try to create another one while still milking the last one.