Many Signal alternatives also have security issues of their own, often making them less secure than Signal. This includes Matrix and XMPP. In the blog post regarding XMPP+OMEMO, the author replies to a question about which would be better than Signal, Matrix, and XMPP with this suggestion:
Anyone who cares about metadata resistance should look at Cwtch, Ricochet, or any other Tor-based solution. Not a mobile app. Not XMPP. Not Matrix.
In regards to Ricochet, not having a mobile app version makes it difficult to recommend to less tech savvy people.

For another email provider alternative, I would suggest Forward Email. I still haven't used them yet, but my goal is to switch to them from Proton when I get around to it.
I was thinking of playing around with email hosting, at least for offline backups, and I've been interested in using Stalwart.
I also suggest Porkbun for purchasing a domain.