Hey Chris,
I decided to use AWS instead of purchasing a home server for both cost, speed and maintenance reasons. I've no interest in learning about VMware in a single server scenario.
Using a 200Mb Good instance is currently working out at around $0.50 an hour. I stop everything when its not in use which obviously saves money. Signing up for the 'free tier' also gives you the ability to spin up free Linux and Windows hosts and create a pretty decent lab setup. I've yet to top $10 a month. As you have your own licenses its even cheaper.
As Daniel has said, some of the AWS ways of doing things isn't too obvious to a network guy but with some planning and forethought and once you've read all the F5 guides its not too bad. Of course, its also very easy to zap it all and start again.
I managed to get hold of a license recently so I rebuilt everything from scratch. I'm currently running with a Best license on an M3.xlarge with SSD disk for $0.28 an hr. There are other minor costs for storage etc. but it shouldn't top 0.50hr.