Why is transfer categories ignored by quicken in the budgets?

Gary, this has been widely discussed on this forum ever since the budgeting features were added to Quicken Mac just over two years ago. The short answer is that the functionality to allow users to selectively include certain transfers (especially budgeting for things like loan payments or savings) without including others (like credit card payments) doesn't exist in Quicken Mac.

The need for this functionality has been acknowledged by the product manager as one of the top user requests, and it's something they are likely now working on. (There was a delay because they needed to wait for the separate development team for the mobile/web software re-wrote how they handled budget data; that project was completed a few months ago.) We have no idea what new features are going to arrive when, but it seems reasonable to guess that we'll see this addressed sometime in the next 6 months.

If you want to read more, here is the main thread on this site (there are others if you search) that discusses this issue: Add Ability to Include or Exclude Transfers on Budgets in Quicken for Mac; you should go to that page and click the blue Vote button at the top right of the page to register your desire for this functionality.

In the meantime, people have come up with some awkward ways to double-post certain transactions in order to put something int heir budget, but this approach always creates other problems. My suggestion is that you simply tally the principal you're paying on your loan(s) and add that mentally, or on paper if you print your budget, or export to a spreadsheet an add a line for it there. For most people, this is a single amount to add each month, so this is the imperfect way to deal with it until this needed functionality is added.