I have just been in a similar position with regards to setting the 777 permissions on the apache website hosting directory. After a little bit of tinkering it seems that changing the group ownership of the folder to the "apache" group allowed access to the folder based on the user group.
1) make sure that the group ownership of the folder is set to the group apache used / generates for use. (check /etc/groups, mine was www-data on Ubuntu)
2) set the folder permissions to 774 to stop "everyone" from having any change access, but allowing the owner and group permissions required.
3) add your user account to the group that has permission on the folder (mine was www-data).