Patents cost around $5K, from start to finish, based on what I've learned from doing it a few times. A good portion of that is paying your attorney to research "prior art" to determine if your widget is sufficiently different from existing widgets to warrant a patent. Drawings must be prepared, along with a detailed functional description.
The Patents R Us people are banking on the numbers, that being most stuff people bring in isn't sufficiently unique, or doesn't have enough market appeal. A true patent attorney should be able to give you a decent idea from a face-to-face meeting, but be prepared to pay a few hundred.
If you have a group of friends with $ and family with $ (people who won't beat your ass if you don't make them rich) you can consider forming an S corporation and issue stock to these investors in exchange for the $ they put in the hat. You get your widget patented, make a gazillion $, and S corp shareholders claim their percentage of the profit on their income tax returns with the attached schedule K. Likewise, if your widget loses money, everyone has a percentage of the loss to claim.
All of this said, some companies are big enough that they will roll the dice. They have the finances to steal your idea, patented or not, and get it to market, reap the profits and tell you to piss off because their attorneys are on staff anyway, and they can afford to litigate the ass off a brass monkey.
Good luck.
