My Internet service provider (Cox) provides free web hosting space and I use it for a lot of the smaller sites that don't need a lot of disk space, bandwidth, or more sophisticated features.

If one is looking to run a more professional site, free simply won't work as it will be very lmited.

Most of the top rated professional web hosting sites charge around $7 per month which isn't too bad given what you get at that price.

It all depends on what you want/need to do.