To answer the last part of your post:
So far my experience is that the RCS-iMessage feature is working (or not) depending on the Apple user’s provider. I’m on Android with a “cheap” provider in Canada and RCS-iMessage work with my iMessage contacts that are on major providers but those on cheaper providers don’t work yet.
So if you are on Android and your basic RCS works you should be good.
I have had Zwave Yale locks for almost 10 years now and am pretty happy with them. I have the assure SL (mentionned in another comment) on 3 doors right now and they are rock solid.
The battery is reported to Zwave but you will also get some beeping and flashing on the lock itself when the battery gets low, so even if you don’t see it in HA it is hard to miss and end up with a dead battery.
As a side note, I always bought the push button variant of those locks and stayed away from the touch pad version. Living in Canada it seemed like a bad choice to deal with touchpads in the winter with the gloves and snow possibly melting on it.
If you are using zigbee you should check Sinope Sedna Walter valve with the optional water flow sensor. It is supported in zha using quirks from claudegel on github.
Just make sure you select the ZigBee one since their WiFi one need their proprietary hub to work.
This works very well for tech enthusiasts and people who self-host nextcloud at home.
The issue is when you are a government or university, it becomes harder to get all your users (which are probably not all tech savvy) to install a third party app store deal with the Android warnings about installing from third-parties, etc etc.
And this is probably the user base Google are targeting with this move (assuming it’s malicious) . When the higher ups complain that their files are not syncing and need to install things with a special procedure they sometimes wonder why they are not using M365 or Google which seems hassle free.