From the moment the owner of the Nicolas Inn met us on the street we could not have been more warmly welcomed to the hotel. The owner, Francois escorted us up to our room (it's a 4 room B&B) showed us our immaculately clean, neatly furnished room. After offering us a glass of ice water he took us on a quick walking tour of the surrounding neighborhood, pointing out the breakfast place (a separate restaurant a short distance away), a local gelato place, best pizza stop and a couple of restaurants in the alley behind the Inn.
Francois made dinner reservations for us for the following evening and recommendations for dinner that night. Along with the dinner recommendations he indicated the dishes the establishment was known for. The recommendations were outstanding, we had the best meals of our trip at all 3 of our dinners. Each restaurant was locally owned, small establishment and we trusted Francois' recommendations on dishes. One hint from Rick Steve's we found helpful was to "share" the dishes. We order a shared appetizer and pasta and then couple of main dishes followed by dessert. With house wine we spent about 70 euro per meal. I think our pizza cost us about 7 euro for lunch. The breakfast was "real Italian", at about 7 each morning commuters, local workers come in for a coffee and pastry. We did the same (although we sat at a table instead of standing at the bar), after one day they "knew" us. We picked out our pastry, they made us a cappuccino and brought it to our table (along with a juice). Simple and fun. Yummy pastries by the way.
Our accommodations were quiet, we didn't see or hear the other guests. Our room faced a busy street but with the window closed we didn't hear anything. We occasionally opened the window to get a feel for the street. It was a hot week in Rome so we used the room AC and were quite comfortable sleeping.
Location was perfect for us (50's couple) we took the train from Florence, hopped on the metro and walked 5 minutes to the hotel. Total cost from train station to the hotel 3 euro ( 2 , 1.5 euro metro tickets). We traveled light with a roller board each, and I had a small backpack. The Inn is 2 blocks from the Colosseum. We hopped the metro to the Vatican (easy, use a money belt). We walked to Trastavere from the Inn. We flew out of Rome and again took the metro to Rome Termini and bought tickets for the Leanardo Express at a Tobacco stand in the Termini (14 euro each) to Rome's airport. We happen to hit it just right, catching a train as we entered the station. I think our trip from the Inn to our gate took about an hour (don't count on that).
If you are looking for simple accommodations with a personal touch I wouldn't hesitate to use the Nicolas Inn. It was a wonderful experience for our first trip to Rome.