suiteCRM permissions

For the past 4 days I've been trying to install a working instance of suiteCRM (fork from SugarCRM).  I'm not doing well.

Installing the files was easy enough but setting permissions has been a nightmare.  I used the official install docs (https://suitecrm.com/wiki/index.php/Installation#Downloading_and_installing_SuiteCRM) and when I got to chgrp things got sideways.
the apache usergroup throws internal server error.
Set group to the account username and install can be completed.

however, sugar/suite has very particular permissions and when they're not set exactly right the language file, or cache of language file (I'm a little hazy from here on) cannot be accessed so labels get replaced with "undefined".

The suite forum hasn't been very forthcoming with help so I'm asking here if anyone understands how cwp permissions and ownership works.  What is different from cpanel that would cause the internal server error until I change group and ownership to begin with?  I'd love someone who could explain a full solution but I'd be grateful for just some breadcrumbs to help find it.

Any help is appreciated.