The quality of the cement sheath plays a crucial role in the integrity of the oil well. This study aims at assessing the influence of cement hardening on deformations and stresses to which the sheath is submitted. A numerical model was developed to simulate the different stages of well construction such as drilling, creep action, casing reconstruction and - the focus herein - cement hardening. The salt creep behavior was modeled through a new methodology that combines the Double Mechanism with the Power Law. Two stages were considered for the cement. First, the cement was idealized as a fluid with a hydrostatic stress field. During the first five hours after cementation, a decrease in the hydrostatic stress field was employed in order to simulate the chemical shrinkage and loss of water in the hardening process. When hardened, the cement was considered to behave elastically with an increasing stiffness modulus over time. In the phase change from fluid to solid, special care was given to fitting the cement finite element mesh to the annulus, avoiding mesh overlapping. The new salt creep law showed accurate results when compared to field and other creep data. In the hardening process, the annular dimension reduction was expected and noticed. The deformation rate decreased with the increasing cement stiffness modulus. Most importantly, this deformation was negligible when compared with the dimensions of the well. Moreover, for practical and quick simulations, the hardening step can be avoided.