Living with it? I found VDSL superior to Cable internet in the first place, and fiber's been better than VDSL so far. I especially like the fact that I have wide open upload speeds.
Now, the way AT&T sets their fiber service up requires there to be an ONT box wired inside the house, usually along a wall around where the existing AT&T DMARC exists outside, and another cable going from the ONT to a mandatory AT&T provided router, as AT&T insists on doing the provisioning at the router despite the ONT being able to do so. This forces you to either use their router, or pass through their router to use your own.
Be careful of AT&T's pricing, because they always bury the lede on mandatory router rental costs and extraneous taxes and fees with their internet prices, be it VDSL or fiber. It's also worth noting that AT&T is trying to decommission their copper loop and push everyone to fiber, and won't even take new VDSL orders after next month, which means ridiculous overpriced DSL prices on every tier currently, and sweet, sweet into pricing on fiber that all magically works out to the same price under the first year no matter what tier of service you choose. This guarantees that by next year, when all the dust settles on the contracts and fixed pricing being done, you're probably going to see massive price increases across the board, and good luck negotiating back down to the intro price. That's how they've worked for decades, and it's the same game plan Verizon did back when they were transitioning to fiber a decade ago. It's also worth noting that currently, the no-contract price for AT&T's 1000/1000 service, after mandatory router rental for a device they will always bill you for and taxes, actually runs about or higher than Toast's price, and Toast's price is all inclusive with a one year contract with free mandatory router and a fixed, grandfathered price, along with unlimited bandwidth. AT&T's install price is also higher than Toast's. Given Toast's current 1000/1000 price is already within about $10 of what AT&T is charging currently under promo contract with their data capped fiber service after AT&T finishes nickle and dimeing you, and historically AT&T has charged upwards of $120 after everything for the same service tier barely a year ago? What is there to lose?
It's also worth noting that Toast seems to stick with only shipping Arris routers, whereas AT&T wildcards you with one of three different models currently, and the Arris is the least problematic of the lot.
As far as what happens if Toast goes under?
First, it's not that likely in the near future, and this is the sort of company that won't just disappear like a fart in the wind. They've been around for over 20 years, and they notify and communicate with their customers any changes that may actually impact them. They seem to be financially stable, and they're not the only third party AT&T DSL/fiber provider in the nation. There's also Sonic and DSLExtreme, among others... check them out, too.
Second, so what if they do? You're already going to have AT&T's fiber installed to your house with an ONT. If suddenly Toast vanishes off the face of the planet, you still have the infrastructure and the most costly part of install already done for you, which means a self home install if you have to switch over to AT&T plugging in the new mandatory router. Assuming worst case scenario that Toast disappears without even saying, "we're closing our doors, you should get service elsewhere to avoid downtime" first, you're going to be down... what, 2-3 days? And that's assuming they don't just hand off their enterprise clients (yes, we're considered enterprise clients as Toast subscribers with AT&T personnel, which means we get treated like business clients instead of residential) to AT&T directly under that scenario to keep service working uninterrupted. And before that theoretically potentially unfortunate and fateful day, you literally had X number of months/years that you never had to deal with AT&T directly at a price that's currently actually about competitive with AT&T's fiber service out of contract, that will never increase on you, and will likely to be cheaper than AT&T's in the long run at the same service tier for the time you are with them.
This is a win/win/win scenario, dude. You really can't lose here. I'm honestly a little surprised you didn't already pull the handle last month given the way Charter's been jerking you around.
Even if you don't want to take the risk with Toast, or any other third party AT&T fiber provider? At least go to AT&T's fiber directly. Yeah, it's AT&T, but it's also their fiber service early in the game, and it's not Charter which isn't even functional for you.
The only thing I'd advise you to do is to shell out for a UPS to plug your ONT, router, and any other network and communications equipment into to ensure stable uptime and a few hours of network access after a power failure (especially important if you have home VoIP phone service). I'd also recommend disabling the AT&T router's WiFi, setting it up in bypass mode, and sticking your own router in behind it, as this will both help keep the mandatory provisioning router cooler which means it'll be lest likely to go flaky and die on you, and easier for you to use any third party VoIP services if you need to. Both bits of advice would apply whether you went AT&T directly or with Toast.
