Yeah, I wouldn't buy a cham from them. I just wanted to give the poor little cham with only part of a tail a nice home...I bet a lot of people wouldn't want her because she doesn't have that curly chameleon tail :(
My boyfriend and I were at either PetSmart or Petco about two months ago, and they had a little female veiled who only had about 1/3 of her tail left...apparently someone had bought her and she developed a black dot on her tail and it had to be amputated...they probably just didn't know how to...
I don't know how valid the info on this website I found is, but here it says they can live between 5 and 8 years: http://www.northern-exotics.com/chameleons.htm
But then this website says 1-3 years: http://www.unclemikespetworld.ie/Pages/Reptiles.html