We're the opposite, have tried seed, which didn't take at all, so now we're looking at turf. We're looking into the drought tolerant turfs and leaning towards santa anna, it's quite a lush grass and hard to kill apparently. Very expensive though.
We had santa anna lawns when we moved in, it was rock solid, lovely underfoot, nice even growth, etc. However, we moved away and the tenants trashed the lawn. DH reseeded the empty holes with some other budget lawn seed and it has taken over completely and the lawn is now some other horrible mix. The santa anna lawn was so nice in comparison. Go the santa anna if you can afford it.