What are the benefits and risk of buying US bonds?

I am mainly looking into very safe investments. For now I don't really care if i have little return because I am new at this. Maybe when I understand it more then I will risk more. Which bonds are the best to buy now?

benefits of us bonds? there is only one, but it IS a biggy...You WILL get your money!!

There is nothing safer as far as being paid the promised interest and getting your money back in the end. Think about it.. the govt can print money if it came down to it! They'd first borrow money and raise taxes... but you would get your investment!

risk? well, right now the rate is so low it may not keep up with inflation... in the end, your money would be worth less, technically (still more than Mattress money!) taking on a little higher risk with very high rated bonds might get you a lot higher interest rate.

whatever you do, with interest rates so low right now, the only advice I'd offer is that whatever bond/interest type investment you get into, only go short term. Wait for interest rates to rise a lot before getting into something 10 - 30 years.

Buy bonds (U.S.) that yield interest that varies with the prime rate. Check with your local bank for the proper kind (H series or I series etc.)

The easiest individual bonds you can buy are pref'ds cause they trade intraday and the spread on them won't KILL you. You can find all you need to know about pref'ds at:

http://www.quantumonline.com/

Personally I'd be very wary of buying individual bonds from an online broker because the spreads on them are RIDICULOUS and you will get robbed unless you're talking 100 lot orders (100k $).

So sticking to low expense bond funds or buying individual pref'ds would be your best bet.

Bond CEFs (Closed End Funds) would be good if you want to try and juice up your bond portfolio. You can learn about them at:

www.etfconnect.com

All that being said ... I think putting money into Vanguards S&P 500 Mutual fund is a better place to put excess money then bond funds because over time stocks will always outperform bonds. You're not a professional market timer, so why are you trying to figure out when a good time to put money into stocks is ?